Okay, I must have food poisoning or something. First, I get attacked by members of AVALANCHE. Then, I find myself in another universe where I was part of AVALANCHE. Then, I find out all my memories from the past three years were false. Then, I get a attacked by a dragon and nearly end up drink the lifestream. Now, well I'm back in the 'fake' world with my attackers.

Fantastic.

Oh, and my attacker wants to know how I know her name. Who's the stalker now?

"Oh, lucky guess!" I cringed, smiling cheesily.

The woman looked me up and down sceptically before handing me the plate in her arms. "Here, I thought you might be hungry after our little run in."

Damn. I should have just said I knew her from AVALANCHE. Gawd, I'm such an idiot sometimes.

Sometimes.

I gratefully accepted the plate and shovelled the food in energetically.

"That's an apology for Vincent's attack. He's a bit uptight like that sometimes." Yeah, right. "But what were you doing stealing our materia like that, and what were you doing wondering around in the forest on your own?"

"Um I'm allowed, I'm nineteen." I explained between mouthfuls.

She blinked at me. "Oh, sorry, you just look a lot younger." She laughed. "I'm going to go and get some materia to heal your shoulder, I'll be back in a minute." With that, she walked out of the little tent - pushing my chocobo's head out with her - and her footsteps faded in with the sounds of machinery and people milling about outside.

I finished my plate and placed it neatly on the side before standing up slowly. My shoulder burnt fiercely with every movement but I wanted to see what the outside world looked like.

As I stepped out into world, all the muffled sounds I'd heard before became real and a wind seeped through my skin. I could smell hot food in the air and the huge mountains North of North Corel stood above me like two giant guardians. The wind refreshed me from the groggy, uncomfortable sleep I had just received and I wondered if that whole experience was just a dream.

Thinking back over what had happened, it probably was just a really vivid dream, I mean, who else would believe the last three years of their life was a total lie? I must have remembered the two AVALANCHE members and they were just placed inside the dream too.

But how did I know Tifa's name?

I didn't have much time to dwell on these thoughts as my chocobo nudged me and brought me out of my thoughts, tugging on the sleeve of my shirt. I petted him for a few moments before a familiar man came into sight.

"Hia Vincent." I greeted.

"...How did you know my name?"

Again. How could I be this stupid. Again.

Luckily, I thought of a quick answer. "Tifa told me when I woke up." Nyuk nyuk nyuk nyuk...

He grunted in reply and looked around. "Where is she?"

"I don't know." I shrugged. "She said she was going to get some materia for my shoulder."

He nodded and walked off, presumably to find Tifa, but you never know with that dude.

I returned to grooming my golden chocobo but my mind was still reeling with questions. Their personalities are exactly the same, how could I have known that? I felt confused but somewhat happy, I was glad to be back in my own world.

Only moments later did the gun slinger stride back to my side. "She's not here."

"Who's not here?" I wasn't listening to what he was saying, I was staring behind him.

"Tifa."

"Oh."

He frowned at my answer.

"Hey, wasn't there two mountains there before?" I asked nonchalantly even though my mind was screaming at me.

His frown deepened before he turned around to look.

Behind him, the beautiful view I had awoken to of mountains and forests had been disrupted. Well, not so much disrupted as DISAPPEARED! What looked like a huge black cloud had engulfed one of the mountains in our view and was moving towards the town. As it moved closer, we could see that it wasn't so much of a cloud, more of a giant black sea that disintegrated anything in its path. It was like the land was being covered in huge vat of sticky oil, spreading across the sky and blocking out the sun's rays. You couldn't see it was destroying things but I had a feeling in the depths of my gut to run, to run far away from that thing and stay away. It was also, like I said, moving towards us.

"We need to move." Vincent told me, grabbing my arm and pulling me away from the sea.

But something else happened as we moved. The people who were around us didn't seem to notice, they just went around their normal business.

Oh, and that wasn't it.

A man walked past us and towards the ever nearing void, but when I stuck my hand out to stop him, my hand went straight through him! The man didn't even look up before his body started flickering like a bad light bulb as his body passed in and out out existence. I stepped back towards Vincent in terror. "What's happening?" I asked.

More and more people around us started to disappear and the black oil wrenched it's way through the town. All hope wasn't lost until we saw the same cloud encircling us with no where to run.

"Stay close." Vincent ordered me. He pulled out a gun from beneath his cloak and fired at the gloop. We watched as the bullet seemed to slow down as it neared the void and was absorbed into it.

I grabbed hold of Vincent's golden arm and closed my eyes tight as the wave of black finally engulfed us.

That was it. I knew it. That was it.

Wait, I was still breathing. I couldn't feel anything under my feet, or which way was up but Vincent's arm was still there in my hands.

I pulled my eyelids open again and stared in wonder at what was around me.

Nothing.

All that was around me was black and dense. But for some reason I could still see the tall man by my side, staring into the darkness.

"..."

"Yeah." I replied, reaching out my hand to feel nothing.

Suddenly a force like a current started to drag on me. I held on to Vincent and he seized my other hand as we struggled against the force.

"Don't leave me!" I yelled desperately. My hands were slipping off his smooth metal arm and I couldn't keep my grip. "Please!"

I pulled and pulled but the force was too strong, it was starting to hurt me. Only the ends of my fingertips were still attached to Vincent as the current pushed us apart fiercely. There were tears in my eyes as we finally parted. "No!" I screamed.

He tried to reclaim my arm but he started being pulled in the opposite direction.

"Vincent!" I cried. His body faded into the black and I was left alone, floating in nothing.

OOOOOOOO

I was awoken by two hands on my shoulders shaking me violently.

"Yuffie?" Vincent's head came into vision as he kneeled above me with a concerned look in his eyes.

Vincent? I briefly saw trees around us and a sleeping bag over me through my blurry eyes. I must have been in the 'other world'.

My head throbbed in pain as I clutched hold of him, crying.

"..." He didn't seem to know what to do with a hysterical teen but he sat there and let me hug him, which is all I wanted him to do.

"I was so scared." I whispered into his chest, tears still streaming from my eyes.

Then he did something I never ever thought he'd do. He hugged me back. Not properly, but enough to show he cared.

We sat there for ages in silence, I was just happy to be alive! After, Vincent asked me what had happened and I told him of the 'dream' I'd had. He listened, not once interrupting and still held me when I burst into to tears again.

"We need to find out what's happening." He merely stated after I was over my crying fit and he started to pack up our little camp.

I was still in shock from the dream, it was so vivid, was that what it was like to be dead? But I knew we had to find out so I got up out of my sleeping bag-

And immediately jumped back in.

My shirt had rolled up while I was sleeping and guess what!

I HAD NO STOMACH.

NONE.

NADA.

ZILTCH.

Well, just like my toes I could still poke it and feel it, but you couldn't see it!

What is wrong with me?

That was probably a good time to tell Vincent, but no, I kept it to myself. It was too gross.

I pulled my top back down and slowly got out of my sleeping bag, careful so it didn't ride up again.

"Ready?" He asked as I packed up my stuff.

"Uh huh." I replied, pulling down my top again, incredibly self concious, and starting off into the trees towards the stream.

We'd only been walking for a hour or two before we spotted an old wooden shed nearby the river. Planks were rotting and falling off the roof, plus it was only the size of a toilet, but we stopped twenty feet away and discussed a plan of entry.

My idea was to just bust in there and kick any ass we saw, but someone thought it would be too risky.

Instead, we decided to enter with the utmost secrecy.

"Can you do that?" Vincent asked me.

"Duh. I'm a ninja, ninjas are like the Kings of being silent. Or Queens." I replied, walking towards the shed.

I pulled the metal latch on the old wooden door upwards slowly and pulled it open. I looked into the black room and waited for my eyes to adjust. There nothing there but a large hole in the ground in which a staircase had been carved into the stone. You couldn't see anything past the fifth step but you could smell dampness and something rotting down there.

"Grossness." I muttered to myself. "I'm guessing we're going down there?" I whispered to Vincent.

He grunted at me, his gun by his side.

I sighed. "Yay! Dark holes in the ground, my favourite."

Vincent shushed me immediately.

"Oh, like they're going to hear us coming." I joked, turning round.

I really shouldn't have.

I thought I had good balance.

I thought I could take a step back and still stay upright.

But apparently that's too much for a world class ninja. I tripped over my own feet (which partly aren't even there for love of Leviathan!) and went sprawling down the stairs, screaming as I did so. It wasn't that long a staircase, but I knew I was gonna end up with some pretty nice purple bruises the next day. I also managed to ingest a mouthful of dirt as I hit the bottom.

Vincent appeared at my side, his gun pointed in front of me.

I looked up off the floor and stared at all five faces staring back at me. There weren't any proper lights down in this mini cave, but a blue glow came off the computer screens dotted all over the place. Three men and two women all in lab coats stood over the screens and stared in fear at us.

"Not the entrance we were hoping for." Vincent murmured to me.

"It's not like they wouldn't notice us anyway." I replied, picking myself off the floor and readying my Oritsuru. "What are you guys doing?" I shouting to the pale faced group, spitting the dust out of my mouth as I spoke.

They stared at one another before nodding and bringing out weapons of their own from under their coats.

"This is none of your business, but I'm afraid we can't let you leave." One of the men told me, flicking the knives in his hands.

I snickered. "Yeah, you and who's army?" There was still dirt on my tongue so I spat again.

Grossness.

"...This is private property." He ignored my question! I knew that was a blatant lie.

"Really?" I snorted sarcastically. "Well then the real question is, are you hungry?"

The group frowned at me, glancing at each other. Even Vincent looked over at me in question.

"Hungry?" He repeated.

"'Cause you're about to eat my shuriken!" I yelled, letting my Oritsuru fly through the room. It hit one of the females in the gut.

Gunshots rang behind me as I vaulted over one of the screens and claimed my Oritsuru back. I downed one of the men easily by stabbing him in the back and looked over at Vincent. We'd made short work of this bunch, the other woman was already slumped over her screen and another man on the floor. Vincent had the last up against the wall, his gun pointed directly between the man's eyes.

"Please, please don't shoot, I'll tell you anything!" He begged, his hands were up in the air and shaking like crazy.

"What are you doing here?" Vincent demanded.

"W-We were experimenting on the lifestream that surfaced in the stream next to us." He stammered.

"Why?"

"Well you see-" Vincent pushed his gun further into the man's forehead. "No, no I'll tell you I promise! We all used to work for Shinra and we knew a lot about lifestream already. We hoped if our theories were correct we could use them to get jobs again."

"What theories?" This question came from me, I was now stood next to Vincent, my Oritsuru in my hand.

"There were reports that when Midgar residents were exposed to the lifestream and got Geostigma, they saw hallucinations before they died. In some cases, they created a whole other reality. We wanted to see if we could create another universe using the lifestream and manipulating someone's memories. We thought in that world maybe Shinra might not have been created and we could have saved everyone a lot of hardship." He admitted.

"Someone's memories. You mean my memories." I corrected him.

He swallowed.

"Aw cat got your tongue? Maybe if I chopped it off you'd find it easier to speak?" I offered, brushing my Oritsuru against his cheek.

"N-No! I mean yes, it was your memories! Please, please don't kill me!" He whined.

"Why shouldn't we?" My Oritsuru was moving closer to the man's throat.

"B-Because it's not our fault. S-Something went wrong when you met people you weren't supposed to meet and the whole world collapsed in on itself." That explained the black void. "Not to mention your alternate body came through to our universe too."

Wait, what?

"Alternate body?" Vincent repeated, his gun still being pushed between the man's eyes.

The man nodded quickly and his bulging eyes glanced at me. You could see sweat pouring out of him.

"...Me?" I whispered. "I'm... I'm an alternate body?" I stepped back from the man and dropped my Oritsuru. "No." I said shaking my head. "No, it's not true, I'm not."

"Are you lying?" Vincent asked slowly.

"No, no I promise!" The scientist squealed.

"Where's her real body then?"

"Through the door over there, she's fine honest, she just can't wake up while her other body's in this universe. They can't exist at the same time." He explained, pointing shakily to a door on the other side of the room.

Vincent removed the gun slowly from the white garbed man's head and moved closer towards him, so now they were only inches away from each other, and whispered, "Run."

The man did so immediately, and not very gracefully. He stumbled passed me and shot up the stairs to our left.

By this time I had retreated to leaning on one of the computer screens for support. To be told that you aren't real, that you are a computer simulation, is too much for one brain to handle. My breathing had increased rapidly and my head started spinning.

"He might still have been lying." Vincent murmured when he saw me.

I shook my head - which made the dizziness a lot worse. "It explains everything. Even this." I pulled up my shirt and showed him my non-existent stomach, through which you could see the blue screen behind me.

He stared, his blood red eyes reflecting the monitor's display. "...When did this happen?" He asked slowly.

"This morning. My toes disappeared when we were still in North Corel." I admitted, a single tear falling down my cheek.

He grunted. "We must see if he's lying. I know it will be hard." His eyes were still on my missing stomach.

I nodded again and shuffled towards the door, my heart beating like a hurricane as I approached. My warm hands touched the metallic handle and turned it slowly.

This was it. Whatever was behind this door showed me who and what I was.

A/N: Yes I was able to update! I hope this chapter answered a lot of questions you had but if you're still confused please message me and I will answer! The final chapter will hopefully be up tomorrow evening GMT time. I've been overwhelmed with support in the last chapter and I was nearly crying this morning with all the reviews I received! Please, please review again if you want to read the next chapter, support is all I have!