Disclaimer: I don't own FFVII, Crisis Core, Before Crisis, or any other part of FFVII. I don't own 8-Bit Theater either.

AN: Well, been a little while, hasn't it? Anyway, like I said in the latest update on Oath, for anyone reading any of my other stories, most of them should be getting updates pretty soon. I know I say that a lot, but they really should.

"Talking"

Thoughts

Time Passage

Tifa unclipped the seatbelt, thanking whatever gods she could think of that it wasn't jammed, and leaned forward as she dropped, letting out a grunt as her back hit the ground. She turned as she heard a groan from Aerith, and it was simple to tell that the girl was dazed from the impact as she began to work at the pink-clad woman's seatbelt. She heard it click, and pushed herself under the other girl as she began to drop, trying to lower her to the ground without the fall being as jarring as her own had been.

She jumped with a start as the drivers-side door was ripped off its hinges, Zack, Barret, and Nanaki leaning down to look in. She pushed Aerith towards the door, and twisted on to her stomach to begin pulling herself out as Zack lifted Aerith from the cabin. She'd just grabbed Barret's hand and gotten free of the opening when several shots rang against the side of the truck, and they all ducked towards the most well-covered areas they could, trying to get a glimpse of the attacker.

It was when she saw the "tank" that had been chasing them, trembling and crackling with electricity but still barely standing, that she realized Cloud wasn't in sight.

"Where's Cloud!"

Zack turned, looking around worriedly, and leaned over the now-recovering Aerith as more shots rang out. He seemed to curse to himself as Barret leaned around the side of the truck and fired off several shots, pulling back and looking at them with a frustrated stare.

"Thing has some tough-ass armor. Bullets are jus' bouncin' off." He looked over the gun for a moment, and turned to the group. "We need us a plan, 'cause I'm runnin' low here."

Nanaki peered through the window at the machine. "It seems slower than before." A shot went wide, scraping the side of the truck. "Less accurate as well."

Zack forced himself to calm down, considering the situation. "We have any materia?"

"No. Cloud…" Tifa trailed off.

"Got it. Well, I could probably take it out if I could get a little closer. Tifa, Red, think you could do a little distracting?"

Tifa pushed aside the somewhat morbid thoughts of what might have happened to her friend, and stretched her legs for a moment, making sure she was still fit after the crash. As Nanaki mirrored the action, she nodded an affirmative.

"Alright then. Barret?" He leaned Aerith against the side of the truck.

"Yeah, yeah. Let's jus' do this." He swung around the side of the truck, firing his gun-arm as Tifa and Nanaki took off from the other side, and began running as the "tank" attempted to target all of them. Its attention focused elsewhere, Zack leapt from behind the truck and charged it. The automated weapon seemed to realized he was coming, but by the time its weapons were readjusted, he'd already jumped on top of it, and drove the Buster Sword into the gash Cloud had left earlier.

It flailed for a moment, and the Buster Sword came lose, throwing Zack to the ground. The nearly-ruined machine began to twist towards him, but was suddenly sparking with electricity, and he could make out Cloud kneeling at the side of the bridge, right hand hanging at his side, remnants of a lightning spell fading from the other. Zack dodged around the tank, gears crackling and exploding, and saw Tifa doing the same as Nanaki calmly followed them.

As he got closer, he stopped to lift the still unconscious Aerith into his arms as Barret stood to join them. When Tifa lifted Cloud's right hand and began to look it over, he could easily make out the blood dribbling from it. Thinking about what'd happened, he decided Cloud must've grabbed one of the crane cables as he was falling. It was the only way he could have gotten back to the highway so quickly, and considering how cheap Shinra was when it came to the non-essential parts of their uniforms…Well, he wouldn't honestly find it all that surprising if it had managed to rip through the thin leather gloves.

In fact, he and Kunsel had always had a half-hearted conspiracy theory about why Shinra was so cheap when it came to their standard uniforms. They'd been convinced that the company spent less on their provisions so that their troops would have to give back half their paychecks to get some remotely decent equipment from Shinra's weapon and armor suppliers.

"Hey buddy. Had us a bit worried there. Guess you figured out how to use the materia though, eh?" He felt Aerith shift, and looked down just as she opened her eyes.

"Heya, beautiful. You alright?"

"Yes," She replied with a nod. "I think I'm okay."

Grinning, Zack lowered her to her feet. Once she'd steadied herself, she took a single glance at Cloud's hand and immediately went to examine it. Having seen the older girl's skill with magic earlier, Tifa moved aside to give her a better view of the wound. She pulled the glove off, taking care to be gentle, and the now-familiar soft green glow spread a few inches along Cloud's palm. As it faded, she looked up at him.

"I'm sorry, but that's all I can do for now. I managed to close most of the cuts, but you'll still want to keep it bandaged for a few days." Even though they didn't completely understand how Aerith was able to use magic without any materia, it wasn't too difficult to believe that she was getting tired. She'd been making shields and healing people for a while by this point, so it was bound to take some kind of toll.

"Thanks." Cloud gave her a grateful nod. "It feels better."

"So, what's the plan now?" Barret called over his shoulder as he leaned to look off the edge of the unfinished highway. "Ain't gonna be able to stay in Midgar, that's for damn sure."

Zack crossed his arms, pacing as he thought. "Let's see, the closest town to Midgar was…"

"Kalm." They glanced over at Tifa. "The nearest town is Kalm. Master Zangan and I passed through several years back, when he brought me to Midgar." She'd barely been conscious at the time, considering she'd still been suffering from her injuries at Nibelheim, but she remembered Zangan giving her some information on just about every place they'd stopped at along the way.

"Well, guess that'd be a good place to start. Better 'n standin' around on the highway waitin' for them Shinra jackasses to catch up." Barret turned back to the group. "So what's the deal with this Sephiroth guy? He killed the President, so is he tryin' to save the planet too?"

Cloud shook his head with a frown. "No. I'm not sure what he's doing, but after Nibelheim…Not a chance. He must have something else up his sleeve."

"Guys, maybe we should talk about this in Kalm." Tifa looked back across the highway towards Midgar. "I don't think we've got a whole lot of time until Shinra sends reinforcements."

"There's some cables over there. We could prob'ly use them." Barret pointed towards the edge of the road. Cloud raised his injured hand, before slipping the nearly-ruined glove back on.

"You'll wanna wrap your hands with something. Trust me on that one."

"Ahem." They looked down at Nanaki as he cleared his throat. "There could be a minor problem with that." He lifted one of his paws.

Minutes later, Nanaki was praying that the black-haired Ex-SOLDIER wasn't as clumsy as he acted, as the man held him under one arm and lowered them down the cable with the other. Barret had wrapped his remaining normal hand with his jacket, while Tifa had loaned Aerith an extra pair of the leather gloves she always kept on her. Cloud had offered to stick near Aerith, in case her magic use earlier had been more tiring than she'd thought.

"So," Zack tried to make conversation with his "passenger" as they descended. "I wouldn't mind havin' some sword-chucks back there."

Unable to ignore a bizarre statement like that, Nanaki had to ask. "Sword-chucks?"

"Yeah, there this thing from a comic that a buddy of mine showed me back when I first got into SOLDIER. Most freakin' hilarious comic series ever. See, it starts with this guy who uses "black magic" and this dumb fighter guy, and they're walking through a forest…"

He managed to amuse Nanaki with the tale until they'd all gotten to the ground below, but decided to focus on slightly more important matters. He was about to suggest splitting into groups when Barret beat him to the punch.

"So, we should probly split up. Shinra's gonna be lookin' for a big group, right?"

"Sounds like a good idea to me. I get Aerith!" Zack hopped over to the girl, looping an arm around her shoulders as she giggled.

"Hm," Nanaki walked over to the duo. "I think I'll go with them, if there are no objections."

"Aw c'mon, you know you just wanna hear more about Eight-Bit."

Tifa nudged Cloud's shoulder. "I guess that means it's you, me, and Barret then."

"Works for me. Barret?"

"Yeah, it's cool with me. And since we're on this lil adventure, we'll probly need a leader, right?" He did a few mock punches in the air, clearly trying to give them a hint.

Tifa gave Barret an apologetic smile. "Well, I think Cloud should be in charge."

Aerith quickly nodded her head. "I agree with Tifa. Cloud would make a good leader."

"B-But Aerith? C'mon, what about me?"

"Sorry Zack," She mirrored Tifa's earlier apologetic smile. "But you do tend to be a bit, well…"

"Impatient?" Nanaki suggested.

Tifa decided to throw in her own, for the sake of it. "Bull-headed?"

"Overactive?" Cloud chimed in with a thought of his own.

Aerith patted Zack's shoulder as he began to pout half-heartedly. "Oh, it's alright. You can be our team leader."

Barret seemed to share Zack's sentiments.

"Well shee-it. Awright, let's go to Kalm. You can fill us in on this Sephiroth guy at the inn there."

"So we'll meet up again at the inn in Kalm? Sounds like a plan to me! We'll go around south." Zack turned to Cloud with a small wave. "Take care, man."

He returned it with a nod, and a quick "You too."

With that, the two groups split, one going north, the other south.

Half an hour later, Zack's group…

Zack walked towards a glowing greenish-blue crystal with a curious expression. He'd seen plenty of these fountain-like Mako crystals that soldiers often set up camps around due to the large crystal's ability to provide magic and warmth without materia, which they'd dubbed "save points" some time before, and he was curious as to when one had sprouted up in the middle of nowhere. Normally Shinra would build a small outpost near these, or if they were in a town, they'd build a Mako Reactor nearby. They were a pretty good sign that Mako was rather abundant in the area, after all.

"Zack," Aerith's voice was a little worried. "I really don't think you should touch that."

"Oh, don't be so paranoid. I just wanna see if i-" He reached towards the glowing crystal, not taking heed of the warning. And as his hand touched it, there was a brilliant flash of green light as the area surrounding the crystal burst into smoke, and he flew several feet through the air onto his back.

Zack's vision went dark, spots of white light blinking in and out of sight, but he wasn't hurt. He was certain that he wasn't hurt. But he couldn't see anything, and he felt like he'd nearly gone deaf. He'd felt this before, somewhere. Wait…Wutai? He heard Aerith say his name, through the fog in his mind, and felt a hand touch his forehead. Seconds later, he heard a different, younger voice coming from the direction of the clearing smoke.

"One, for the honor of her nation…"

Wait…Oh, man. Not this again. She's still doing this?

"Two, with the grace and strength of a true warrior…"

He could make out a small, familiar form that he hadn't seen in a few years, though it was more clearly feminine than it had been the last time. He turned away in boredom.

"Three, to bring Shinra to its knees…"

"I am the Great Ninja Princess of Wutai! Yuffie Kisaragi!" She finished the speech by going into a stance, putting her right leg forward, and twisting as if to throw the large shuriken in her hand.

Zack, frankly, was a little too distracted to care, having already dismissed it as another of her poor attempts at stealing from him. "Aw, man. That seriously smarts. Feels like a freakin' Wyerd stomped on my face." He rubbed the sides of his head, ignoring the young girl's "dramatic" entrance.

"H-hey! You! Are you listening to me!"

"Oh, poor Zack. Here, I'll make it better." Aerith pulled him closer, and he leaned his head into the crook of her neck. As she ran a hand through his hair, a small green glow appeared where it made contact, and Zack felt the throbbing in his head fade.

"Man, having a girlfriend with magical healing powers is so cool!"

Yuffie waved her shuriken at them with a glare. "Hey, don't ignore me! I'm the Great Nin-"

"What an odd scent." Nanaki was sniffing around Zack, picking up the scent of the smoke that had surrounded the "Save Point" with ease. "It reminds me of a plant that we used to create a rather powerful anesthetic back in my homeland. I'd never considered that it could possibly be utilized as a weapon of some kind."

"Hey, old people!"

"Yeah, that's it!" Zack realized with a smile. "I knew I recognized this. A lotta Wutai soldiers used it during the war. I don't think I've ever been that close when one got set off before though. Now I know why the norms hated it so much."

Nanaki tilted his head in curiosity. "Norms?"

"A nickname we had for people who weren't in SOLDIER. Some of 'em liked it, some didn't. It was usually a complement."

They looked over as Yuffie let out a frustrated scream, and began stomping her foot and waving the shuriken in the air.

"I said listen to me! C'mon, please!"

"Hey kid, long time no see!" As Aerith and Nanaki looked at him in confusion, she paused and looked at him for a moment, and a hint of recognition glinted in her eyes.

"You! You're that Shinra sap that kept taking my treasure!"

I took-Well she definitely has a strange way of remembering things. "Riiight. If you say so, kid."

"Don't mock me! I want my Bahamut materia back!"

"Your Bahamut materia? You stole that from me then sent it back in the mail! How the heck is it "your" materia!?"

"Oh, shut up! Who cares about the details? All that matters is that I want my materia back! And if you won't give it back, I want something else to make up for it!"

"Okay, first off, it's my materia. Second, even if I did wanna give you any materia, I don't have any on me to give you."

"Liar! I fought you a bunch of times, and you always had a lot of materia an' stuff!"

Fought me? Now that's a laugh. "No seriously, we don't have any materia. At all. Shinra confiscated pretty much everything I had when I stopped working for 'em."

"What! No way! B-but that means I wasted my trap!" She pointed at them with a cry. "This is your fault! You better pay me back for that thing, 'cause it wasn't cheap!"

"…You set a bomb off in my face, and now you want us to pay you for it? I think you're a little confused, kid."

"If you don't pay me back, then I'll-"

"Yeah, yeah. I've heard it before."

"But I…" She began sniffling, and Zack immediately knew what was coming. "I want…" Her eyes began tearing up. "My treasure!"

"Oh, don't start. That barely even worked when you were a kid. What makes you think it's gonna work now?"

Aerith pushed his shoulder with a slight frown. "We could at least give her something."

"Indeed. She is just a little girl, after all. And she did seem to put some thought into this trap."

"Aw, c'mon! Don't tell me you're fall-" At their serious looks, he sighed, and thought it over. Finally, he came to a solution just as Yuffie let out a particularly loud wail.

"Hey kid, how's this sound? We're gonna be traveling a lot, so we'll probably come across some nice goodies. Wanna tag along?"

"C-can I…" Her cries began to die down, and she looked up at them with eyes that reminded him of a sad baby chocobo. "Can I have any materia?"

He began to protest before catching another slightly disappointed look from Aerith, and deflated a little.

"Yeah, sure. When this whole thing is over, I'll give you your pick of materia. Happy now?" Having finally gotten a promise of rewards, she lunged up, wrapping her arms around his waist with a grin.

"Thank you! Thankyouthankyouthankyou!"

As he felt something being pulled out of his back pocket, he pried her off of him and held her in the air by her shoulders. He glanced to his wallet, which she'd promptly dropped on the ground with a small "eep" as he'd lifted her, and raised an eyebrow.

"Um, old habits?" She gave him a sheepish grin as he set her down, and he crouched to pick up the wallet, watching her the whole time. He flipped through it to make sure nothing had been taken, not that he'd had a whole lot to take. When he found nothing out of place, he stood up and gave her a smile, and turned to his amused comrades.

"Well, you guys ready to get to Kalm?"

Aerith gave him a pleased smile, and Yuffie bounded towards Nanaki as he walked ahead of them, apparently fascinated with how "cute and fuzzy" he was.

"So," Aerith nudged his arm. "How'd you two meet?"

"Well, it's a bit of a story, but I was investigating this reactor with Sephiroth, and this message suddenly came up on my phone…"

Meanwhile, Deep below Midgar…

"Are you certain, brother?" The grey-haired man watched as their elder "brother" weakly stood on the platform, still wearing the tattered black and crimson uniform he'd been sporting when they'd retrieved him just days before.

"I offer my sincerest apologies. But there's still much work ahead, and I've been too heavily wounded to act so soon. You will have to move forward without me, at least for the time being." Genesis clutched his right arm as another burst of pain ran through his muscles, a remnant of his duel with the SOLDIER who had finally helped him regain his honor.

Weiss stepped forward, coming to stand next to his younger brother, and knelt before the former SOLDIER. "It was through your creation that we were born, my brother. If your wish is for us to wait, then we shall. But how will we know when the time comes to awaken you once more?"

"With broken wings, we are lifted to a place which none can reach, in a transient eternity of sorrow. One day we shall spread these wings once more, as the final melody of the dirge is complete, and calls softly to our hearts." He released his arm, lowering it towards them as if offering a gift. "You will know…My brothers."

And with that, the cavern seemed to burst into life. Weiss and Nero glanced around in confusion as the Lifestream seemed to pour through every crevice of the cavern, encircling their brother in an entrancing light. As it died down several minutes later, a heavy mist filling the room, they could see him with arms spread out to his sides, head slumped, and eyes closed, a peaceful expression etched on his face, entrapped in a sphere of water.

Turning from their sleeping brother, Nero faced Weiss with a look of concern.

"Lord Restrictor will no doubt become aware of our absence if we don't return soon. What are we to do about our plans?"

Weiss spared one last glance at Genesis, before calmly moving towards the exit, the obvious confidence in his gait soothing some of Nero's concern.

"As I told our brother, for now we shall wait. We're in no hurry to remove Lord Restrictor from power. As long as he suspects nothing, we have time to spare. In the meantime, we should await the arrival of an unrestricted recruit who might suit our needs. Besides," He looked at Nero with a grin that he'd long since learned to recognize as a sign that meant he was eager to shed blood. "My new weapons are nearly ready. Perhaps I'll finally have the chance to test them on some more worthy prey."

As his brother's dark laughter echoed through the caverns, Nero couldn't help but allow his lips to twist into a warped smile, a promise of the pain he intended to bestow upon those who had wronged his "family" in Deepground.

Yes, be it sooner or later, they would make Shinra pay for the suffering they'd inflicted on their "experiments."

AN: Well, hope y'all enjoyed, as per usual. And if you're not familiar with Lord Restrictor, or the rebellion in question, pay a visit to my forums. I should have more information up pretty soon on some of the other characters that have only appeared in certain Japan-exclusive FFVII materials (Well, unless you count youtube), the Restrictors included.

Of course, like most of the Turks, they won't play an exceptionally large part in the story. But we will be seeing little cameo appearances from them once in a while. If you're curious about the origin of Genesis' final lines for some reason, they were a combination and modification of some lyrics from "Redemption" and "Mind Forest" by Gackt, whom Genesis was based on.