A/N: Ten chapters and almost fifty reviews! This story is going strong. Augh! I just got Advent Children, and I was all excited. I saw Nanaki running, and then Reno popped up. He started talking Japanese! I was so frustrated! I don't have my DVD remote…augh…

Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy 7. If I did, Advent Children wouldn't be in Japanese now would it? Damn foreign language…

Beeria: There will be if I have any say in it. And I should, since this is my story. I felt sorry about writing about Laura's mom, though. Sigh.

Teddy-the-Bear: I know! Forty. It's unbelievable when I think back to the other stories with OC characters that I wrote. I'll try and slow down, but I do like to write. And, yeah, he got what was coming.

bdsproductions: Thanks. I love to hear stuff like that about my work. I call all anonymous people anonymous, but I'll make an exception this time. Oh, and you'll see about her old man.

Princess of the Knight: You had a bad weekend? I'm glad my stories are good enough to look forward to, then! My weekend was good because I finally got Advent Children. Yay!

Ghost in the Mirror: Thanks. Sure thing!

AerithRosey: I know. Hehe, I had fun writing that part. And I always take good suggestions unless it doesn't work with what I have planned. That's right! I have something planned now! I really tried to make that fire scene good. Her mom…well, I didn't want her hurt in the fire, but I wanted her out of the way.

Chapter Ten

Apparently, while Brandon was out, his parents had had a fight. His father suddenly apologized to his mother, they made up, and he asked her, jokingly, out on a date. Brandon sighed; his parents were weird.

"We'll be back after you two should be asleep," his father told him sternly. "You can invite over a few friends. In fact, I prefer that you do. I don't want you alone with a girl in the house like last time. You can order pizza and watch some movies, but go to bed around eleven, okay? And be nice. That girl's been through a lot."

"Of course," Brandon said, glancing at Laura. The kitchen and living room were attached. They were in the living room, and Laura was talking to his mother in the kitchen. Laura laughed at something his mother said, and Brandon smiled. He didn't like seeing her sad.

His father gripped his shoulder. "I know you like her, kid," he said, ruffling his son's hair. "You sure found a difficult girl to take care of." He looked up at his wife. "Hey, come on, Barbara."

His mother smiled at his father and said goodbye to the two kids. Immediately after they left, Brandon grabbed the phone and called Tiffany.

"What happened?" she asked as soon as she picked up. "Are you guys okay?"

"We're fine," Brandon said. "We'll tell you everything later, but I was wondering if you and the others could come over to my house."

"Sure," she said. "Garret and Yuffie will be able to go, but I'm not sure if Vincent will. Reno definitely can't. It'd be too dangerous."

Brandon agreed and said goodbye. "They'll be here pretty soon. We might as well order pizza," he said. "No throwing pepperoni at me this time."

"Brandon," Laura said, "there's something I have to admit. I saw…some guy catching my house on fire. It was arson."

Brandon stared at her, surprised. "Why didn't you tell me before?" he asked. "Was it Sephiroth?"

"It was some man in a black suit," Laura said, shaking her head. "He had long hair, but it was black."

"It might be someone working for Sephiroth," Brandon said. "Hold on, I'll go get my gun."

Laura looked at the ground as he ran up the stairs. The police weren't doing anything, and Brandon seemed to want to take it all upon his own shoulder. She shouldn't have told him about the arson.

Someone knocked on the back door. They exchanged looks and Brandon cocked his gun before walking towards the door. When he opened the door, he saw Reno. The wind was blowing fiercely outside and it was beginning to drizzle. Brandon lowered his gun slightly and looked at Reno curiously.

"Sephiroth's planning on attacking you guys tonight. He has your phones bugged. He knows about you guys gathering," he said. "Tseng was outside, keeping an eye on you guys, but he just left."

"How's he going to attack?" Brandon asked.

"Tell Garret to get Jessie when he comes here. Tseng just put a bomb in your basement," Reno said. "I have to go now; before he finds out I'm here."

Brandon nodded in understanding and watched as Reno ran off into the night. He closed the door and looked at Laura. "I'll find the bomb," he said. "Can you tell Garret?"

Laura nodded and watched him run off to the basement. A couple of minutes later, Garret pulled into the driveway. Laura ran outside and told him. He cussed and got back in his car. Tiffany, Vincent, and Yuffie got out and went inside. Laura led them to the basement.

Brandon looked up when the door opened and went back to pushing aside boxes and other stuff to find the bomb. Finally, he found it under a light box filled with his old toys. It was on ten minutes and counting down.

"Oh, God," Tiffany said.

"Reno said something about a girl named Jessie," Brandon said. "Does anyone know who that is?"

"She works for a secret organization," Vincent said. "Her job is making bombs, and she's very good at it."

"What kind of organization?" Brandon asked.

"Something called AVALANCHE," Vincent said. He sighed. "I have some explaining to do.

"Rufus was Shinra's son. He used to own the Turks, but, apparently, Sephiroth does. Rufus's father does more than you think," Vincent said. "Shinra does many illegal things for money, and Hojo's his second-in-command. Ms. Jenova used to be a doctor, and she hated Shinra for selling drugs to people. (Ironic, eh?)

"She was low on cash, however, and had to sell her game to someone. Shinra promised a ton of money. She never got a cent of it. Rufus tried to kill Ms. Jenova, and his attempt at assassination put her on her death bed and him in jail.

"Steven, or Sephiroth, was sent to jail for trying to murder Shinra. He killed Rufus instead and apparently managed to escape by faking death. I don't know how. He then killed Cid, and that's how I got in jail."

"But what about AVALANCHE?" Yuffie asked.

"He's getting to that," Tiffany said.

"AVALANCHE is an organization that used to be part of Shinra's organization called SOLDIER, but they split up when they began to disagree about several things," Vincent explained. "Now AVALANCHE wants SOLDIER dead. Sephiroth's bound to get in the way, though, because he wants SOLDIER dead by his hands. SOLDIER, the Shinra Co., us, and every last player of FF7."

"So, pretty much, we just got caught between a huge "gang" war and Sephiroth's revenge?" Brandon said. Vincent nodded.

"I think we should join AVALANCHE, then," Tiffany said.

"Yeah," Yuffie agreed enthusiastically.

"So many people involved with FF7 are turning up dead," Laura said. "I agree with you. We need to target SOLDIER and Shinra Co., and AVALANCHE is the best organization to go to."

"Ask Garret about it," Vincent said. "He's their leader."

"What?" Brandon demanded. "Why doesn't he tell us anything?"

"He probably wants to protect us," Tiffany said. "Don't be so hard on him."

Brandon looked at the bomb. Eight minutes remained. "What's taking him so long?" he asked aloud.

Laura sat next to him on the ground. He looked at her and sighed. "I need to calm down, huh?" he said.

"You figured it out on your own," she said with a smile.

They sat around, occasionally glancing at the bomb. It read seven minutes…then six…then five…then four…then three…then two…They were started to panic. What if it blew sky high while Garret was still out?

Garret suddenly burst through the door to the basement and barreled down to them, a young woman in her twenties behind him. She immediately began to examine the bomb. The look of surprise on her face startled them.

"That's weird…" she said. "Hey, Garret, look at-"

"No time for that Jessie," Garret said. "Just deactivate the damn thing."

Jessie went to work. They watched the seconds count down, but it turned off all of a sudden. She smirked, wiping off her hands.

"Now what're you talkin' about?" Garret asked.

"This thing…is one of my own models that I keep at the base," Jessie said. "It went missing a couple of days ago. If Sephiroth can infiltrate our base, we have trouble, plain and simple."

Garret scowled. "Tell Wedge to beef up security," he said. "There's no way he's gettin' through again."

Jessie nodded and left the basement. Garret turned to look at his friends. "I guess you got a lot of questions, huh?" he said.

"Vincent pretty much answered everything," Brandon said.

Garret looked at Vincent. "Why're you so well-informed?"

"I used to be part of the Turks," he said, looking off to the side.

"We're going to join AVALANCHE," Yuffie said, bouncing up.

Garret looked around. "All of ya?" he asked. Everyone nodded. He punched Brandon on the shoulder. "That means you and your spiky ass gotta listen."

Brandon smirked. "As long as you promise to tell us everything when it comes up," he said.

"It's a deal," Garret said with a nod. "Now let's get our asses up to the livin' room. Where's my damn pizza?"

(later that night)

It had been fun, but all good things must come to an end. His parents came home, interrupting what could've been a particularly devastating pillow fight between Garret and Yuffie. Garret drove them all home, waving away his parents' thanks. Soon, it was just Laura and Brandon in the living room, his parents upstairs in their room.

Laura laughed at the movie they were watching. His parents had bad taste. She wasn't laughing at the joke but the stupidity of the whole thing. It was supposed to be serious, but that's what made it more ridiculous.

"I'm going to get on the computer," Brandon informed her. Laura nodded without moving her eyes from the TV. With a shrug, Brandon stood and went up to his room.

Cloud ran across the barren valley region. No one was online there. He doubted they would be this late. That explained his surprise when he saw a figure in the distance. Thinking it might be one of Sephiroth's lackeys, Cloud rushed up. The ground suddenly rushed up under him, and he was lifted high above the ground, cursing. He hadn't yet raised enough gil to buy any materia, the source of many fighters' magic. This bastard had an advantage.

The column of earth kept rising. Cloud just jumped off and pulled out his blade, falling toward his opponent. Sure enough, the person was wearing a black cloak. This one had his hood pulled down, revealing very light eyes and fiery, spiked hair. He put his hand flat on the ground and pulled a huge stone shield out of the earth just in time to block his attack.

Cloud chipped away at his opponent's shield, but all he did was block. The thing was so big; it concealed his body from Cloud's view. Finally, Cloud lunged forward, slammed into the shield, and knocked his opponent down. When he kicked away the shield to finish him off, the guy sunk into the earth. A message popped up. He removed his helmet to look at it.

"Sephiroth will meet you tomorrow was eight for a match. Do you accept?"

Brandon stared at the screen, his hands flexing over his keyboard. He began to type his answer.

"No!" Laura said from his doorway. He clicked enter before he could stop himself and looked into her wide green eyes. The suddenly narrowed and she shook her head, her ponytail moving back and forth. She took off out of the room and down the stairs. Before he could catch up, she was out the door and in her jeep. Brandon grabbed his bike and pedaled after the fading twin lights at the back of her jeep.

Sephiroth's POV

Sephiroth waited impatiently for Cloud's answer. The computer he stood before had a huge screen, bigger and wider than he was tall. The keyboard stretched halfway around the screen, made up of keys no other keyboard would have.

He smirked when he saw Cloud's acceptance of the challenge. There was a muffled yell behind him. He glanced back at Reno's fiercely burning eyes. His mouth was covered by duct tape and his arms and legs were bound by tightly tied ropes.

"Don't worry, Jacob," Sephiroth said, turning back to the screen. "I'll finish you right after I'm done with your precious friends and your girlfriend." Reno's eyes lowered and he drooped. He was done struggling. This was not good.

A/N: All right, that's it with my tenth chapter. What'd you think? I always welcome comments and suggestions. Please review. By the way, I got my damned remote and watched the movie. It was totally worth the frustration.