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One Degree

They say everyone in the world is connected through six degrees of separation.

For AVALANCHE and the Turks, it's one.

Tseng and Tifa

Clueless

There were two little girls in this dark crowd today.

Tseng's eyes drifted from the flower girl in the pink dress to a dark haired girl was walking, stumbling, crying in the midst of this shady crowd. But the hat little girl with dark stopped dead in her tracks, and Tseng followed her gaze, which led straight to Aeris. A smile curled onto Tseng's lips. Yes, Aeris…drew eyes like a magnet, pink in the maze of dark lab rats. However, the next person to look upon the flower girl was much less innocent. From his place in the shadows, he straightened. None of the passerbyers saw him, but he saw them. He saw them all, from the business man having the sordid affair to the poor slum man starving so he could feed his family. But for now, he only saw the flower girl and the sleazy man.

The man got a well deserved thump on the head. Tseng smirked, but knew that the man's next reaction wouldn't be walking away. So he walked smoothly from the shadows that seemed to stick to his blue suit. He walked calmly and deliberately, staring at the sleazebucket the whole time. Apparently he felt Tseng's eyes on him, because the sleazy man turned and saw the suit – his face contorted into a look of panic and horror and he quickly fled.

Good choice.

He walked up to Aeris, who always hated being confronted like that (but a for little girl selling flowers, it was bound to happen), and hated hitting people even more. She seemed slightly upset, so he bent down, hands on his knees as he whispered in her ear. "Why don't you go home Aeris – the bad man's gone."

Of course, that was so far from true he could barely contain his laugh. The bad man wasn't gone, the bad man was whispering in the flower girl's ear, the bad man was slowly walking away from the girl, following the sleazy pedophile. Once the sleazy man was far out of eye and ear shot of the flower girl, Tseng silently fitted a silencer on his gun and shot once, twice. The man fell to his knees, then faceplanted in the ground. Tseng tucked away his gun and turned back to return the way he came – men like that didn't deserve to hear their own death whistling too them.

Maybe Tseng didn't deserve to either – but he wasn't that worried. Silencers had long been out of even the black market, until everyone forgot how to make them or didn't want to give them up. Probably three existed in the world.

The Turks had two of them. The third was buried under a floorboard in a house owned by an old man who lived in Mideel.

Tseng felt pretty safe.

As he walked back, he stopped – Aeris was walking towards her house, staff in one hand, basket in the crook of her other arm. Something melted inside of him, and he shook his head briefly. He began to walk again, when another voice made him stop. "Wait!" a little girl's voice cried. He turned to see the little girl from the crowd running up to Aeris, a bundle of flowers in her hand. Tseng watched the exchange between the two girls silently, until the little brown haired girl turned from her father to Aeris – except Aeris had gone.

But as the little girl turned turned, her eyes alighted on him and wine-burgundy eyes locked with his. Those eyes stared into his, as if seeing past the blue suit, seeing not brown eyes but the window to his soul, staring deep at his darkest secrets. She tilted her head just the slightest bit, as if squinting through his window, and trying to understand what was happening inside. That little girl stayed there, and he was trapped in those unique wine-burgundy orbs.

Almost as unique as Aeris'.

She met his eyes one last time, and in wine pools he saw the most unexpected emotion – sympathy.

Then she turned away, as if he was never there, and rushed to her father.

Tseng shook his head and turned to follow Aeris home, never knowing he'd see those same eyes years later, staring at him through the picture in her file; a file made after she attempted to take down Sephiroth with his own sword. An attempt that she made when Sephiroth murdered the very man crying behind her. No clue that a couple years after that, he'd see those eyes once again, again through a picture, this time about her involvement in AVALANCHE. No clue that not even a year after that, he'd see those wine-burgundy eyes one last time, looking at him the same way they had those many years ago – filled with sympathy. Except that time, he'd deserved it, dying with a sword wound, red blood darkening his blue suit.

But who was it to say that he hadn't deserved it the first time?

After all, he was Clueless.

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A/N: Hope you're enjoying these. Give me feedback - does it suck? Is it good? Could I do better?

Tifa and Tseng, no more than a glance in the crowd. I'm having trouble figuring out how to do Vincent, since he was asleep when they were all born - except Cid and Barret. Well, I have an idea for one - Vincent and Yuffie - but I don't know if that's next or not. Suggestions welcome. Probably Reno and Tifa next, or Reno and Marlene since it's the only two I can think of. Will happen when they're (well, REno) older than the age Tifa and Aeris are here.