Yes, I know it's been like beyond forever. By vote, it's Advent Children break time! No idea when the next update will be.

I don't own 'em.

They ended up going to a movie with Kairi at the boardwalk. It was some silly vampire-romance film that the girl pretended to dislike but both boys knew she really loved the book series it was based on. Only out of respect for her did they manage to keep their mouths shut and not totally rip it apart. They managed to get it all out of their systems on the walk back to Riku's house.

"…well, I don't care what the reasoning is, it's still a stupid concept." Riku shook his head as they entered his house. "And for you to know that much about the plot of the fourth book, you have to be secretly reading it."

"I'm not!" Sora protested loudly. "I swear! I don't read books I want to read, why I would I even think about reading those dumb things?"

"Then how do you know so much about Edward and Bella's anti-Christ?" Riku tossed his keys on the small table near the door.

"Because Selphie doesn't know how to shut up about it! I freakin' know more about those darn books than I ever want to!"

"I totally believe you." The silvered one smirked in a teasing manner.

"Oh, shut up." Sora shoved his shoulder. He then moved further into the living room and threw himself down on the couch. "Okay, now we need something to get that stupid movie out of our heads."

Riku shrugged. "I'll give you a choice: keep playing with yourself or watch another movie."

Sora lifted his head and twisted up his face. "You purposely said it that way, didn't you?"

"In what way?" asked the older teen innocently, walking toward the coffee table and the small package he had gotten the mail earlier.

"Never mind." Sora sat up and watched Riku pick up his mail. "So what is that anyway?"

"A movie but you aren't interested." Riku tore open an end of the heavy envelope. "Besides, it isn't in our language so you'd have to read subtitles throughout the whole thing. However it does have some kickass fight scenes…"

This got Sora's attention. "Oh yeah? That could be really cool. I mean, how much can they really say during a fight?"

Riku chuckled as he pulled out a thin DVD case. "Well, Cloud isn't much of a talker anyway."

"What?"

The taller male turned the case so that Sora could see the cheap, homemade cover that Riku's supplier had made for his translated bootleg.

"Hey!" Sora shot up and yanked it from Riku's hand. "That's Cloud and Sephiroth!"

"Duh."

"This is that Advent Children movie you keep talking about!" Sora excitedly ran around the coffee table and went for the DVD player. "We totally have to watch it!"

Riku folded his arms. "What about you and your adventures on the high seas?"

"Meh, that can wait." The brunet removed the disc from the case and placed it in the player. "I'm tired of video games right now. This sounds a whole lot cooler. Now turn all of this on cause I can't figure this system out."

Riku chuckled and grabbed the two removes off the nearby end table. His parents had a top of the line entertainment system that even confused them sometimes. If the settings on it were not just right, you got nothing.

The screen lit up and the same picture from the cover appeared on the screen. Sora grinned madly and bounded back over to the couch. He again flopped back on it. "Okay! Let's watch this thing!"

Riku dropped down on the other end and started the DVD. While he had seen a handful of scenes and knew the basic plot, this was all going to be new for him as well. Hopefully it was not going to prove to be too confusing.

Grand music played as three red animals ran toward a bluff. Upon reaching the end, it panned to a collection of broken up structures covered in bright green plant life. A flock of birds flew overhead and the screen faded to black and said something about 498 years before.

As a mountain came into view, Sora frowned. "Uh, what did that have to do with anything? Why do we care about something like five hundred years in the future?"

"No idea but that's the final scene of the game so I guess they decided it was necessary."

"Huh."

People started talking and they both shut up. There were gunshots and a helicopter with a redhead piloting. The redhead, Reno, had lines on his face. "Is it just me or do red haired people have a thing for facial tattoos?"

Riku snorted. "I was just going to ask that. Maybe it's just the game creator's weird thing."

"You know, we could really mess up our heads if we tried analyzing how much of our reality comes from these things or if they all come from reality." Sora angled his head. "It would be like, the ultimate debate of existentialism."

"Yeah," agreed Riku. He was rather impressed that Sora had made that observation. Sora was not an idiot by any means but he definitely was not very book smart. "Which is why I don't try to make sense of it. We exist; these series exist; that's it."

"Good idea." The helicopter had disappeared and was replaced by a black field with long, twirling ropes of faded green-blue and a sprinkling of likewise colored dots. "What is-?"

A girl's voice started speaking and the two teens quickly read the translation on the bottom of the screen. As the short narration of prior events and things the viewer needed to know went on, Sora's brow furrowed deeper and deeper. When it started going into SOLDIER and Sephiroth, he shook his head. "Okay, wait. I'm lost. There was some Jenova thing and the soldier guys got her cells and because of that Sephiroth decided he had to destroy the world?"

Riku paused the movie. "Okay, the way I understand it is the Shinra Company found these remains and mistook them for something they called the Ancients who were a race of people that were in some sort of symbiotic relationship with the planet. Some scientists tried to re-create this race by placing cells from the remains into their bodies.

"I don't think that all of SOLDIER got them, I think that's a mistranslation but the really powerful ones did. Sephiroth was made to be the perfect SOLDIER and had them added before birth unlike Cloud who got them later."

"Wait, Cloud has those cells?" Sora started. "How come he's nothing like Sephiroth?"

"Because he didn't go through what Sephiroth did. Cloud just had those cells added to him after the whole Nibelhiem thing." Riku tried to explain as simply as possible. "Sephiroth was an experiment from birth. When he found that out, he went insane. Since the Jenova cells were an actual part of him, he started hearing her and became obsessed with carrying out her wishes which was to destroy the planet."

"O-kay." Sora clearly still did not get it but he shrugged it off. "Whatever, I'll just ask them about it whenever we see them again."

Riku highly doubted that they were ever going to see any of the people they had met during their travels again but said nothing. He knew Sora held tightly to the belief that they would. Even if they did somehow manage to, he really doubted that Cloud, or Sephiroth for that matter, were going to want to go into the whole mess with Sora.

He restarted the movie and the girl was now talking losing someone she loved in a battle. At the scene that came up with that, Sora literally jumped up. "That's Cloud and Aerith!"

"Yeah," agreed Riku slowly.

"But Aerith isn't dead! She's there with all of the others!"

Aqua eyes narrowed a bit. "She is?"

"Yeah! She was always really nice and was so happy to see us."

"Huh," Riku pursed his lips for a moment. "Well that's interesting cause in Seven, Sephiroth kills her."

"He what?"

"Yeah, it's the whole reason Cloud is so emo in this movie."

"Okay, that's just messed up." Sora dropped back down. "Unless she like, came back from the dead or something which I guess is possible. I mean, it isn't like we haven't come across that happening before."

"True."

The girl was now wrapping up something about the planet using the Lifestream as a weapon to counter the large meteor that was crashing upon its surface. Sora did not seem to care anything about this so Riku did not bother to attempt to explain it. It was a good thing, too, because he figured it would have taken at least an hour to go into the whole Black and White materia thing, then to detail Meteor… That was not something he wanted to get into. A lot of it he did not really understand.

The girl's narrative shifted to a disease she called Geostigma and a bunch of kids with dirty skin and one slumping over. She said something about it being because the Planet was angry, which did not make sense to either Riku or Sora. Why would the planet be angry at the people who were trying to defend if? Plus it looked like only kids had the disease and they wouldn't have had anything to do with any of that.

They finally got to see the girl, sitting beside a boy lying in bed with a strip of cloth on his forehead. The cloth slipped away to reveal a small dirty patch and he asked her how it looked. She gave him a weak smile and the overlay voice asked that the boy, Denzel, not be taken away.

"That's…kinda sad," Sora commented softly. "I wonder if they're siblings or something."

"Naw, from what I pieced together, Marlene was one of Cloud's friend's adopted daughter and Denzel was a kid Cloud found and brought in off the street."

"Oh." The younger teen nodded. He abruptly sat up and grinned. "Hey, it's Tifa!"

"How many of these people did you meet?" Riku hated to admit to it but he had often tuned Sora out when he went on one of his long stories about his travels. It wasn't that Riku didn't care or got bored, he simply felt depressed hearing them.

"Um…" Sora tilted his head and counted on his fingers. "Cloud, Tifa, Aerith… and I think Yuffie and Cid came from the same world, too. Oh, and Sephiroth."

"So pretty much everyone."

"I guess." The brunet twisted to watch the movie again. Cloud was now onscreen, sitting astride a sleek black and gold motorcycle. As he put away his phone, the title appeared. "Dude! That motorcycle is awesome looking!"

"I know!" Riku grinned. "It's like…sex on wheels."

"Yeah- wait, what?" Sora gave his best friend a strange look.

"It is! I mean, look at it, all sleek and shiny…" Riku let out a low breath. "I bet she purrs like nuttin' else."

"Okay…" Sora continued giving Riku that look a moment longer before turning back to the television. "You've got some weird kinks, Ku."

"I didn't say I'd have sex with it, Sora. I said it was like sex."

Sora stared at him. "And how would you know?"

The silvered teen blushed a bit and focused on the TV. "Cloud's leaving."

"Huh?" Sora also again returned to the screen. The blond swordsman was putting on his sunglasses and had just finished when there was a flash and he gripped his arm. "What was that?"

"No idea." Riku murmured as Cloud drove off.

More motorcycles appeared, stopping on another cliff side overlooking the ruined city and the driver of one kicked at the large sword embedded in the rock. It flipped over to lay flat on the round as the picture changed to reveal three silver-haired men. "Who are they?"

Before Riku could answer, a soft voice asked if the city they were facing was where Big Brother lived. A more nasally, almost childish voice replied maybe and then a third much deeper one told the first to not cry. All three were in variations of the same black leather clothes.

"Are they all supposed to look like Sephiroth?" Sora asked rather redundantly. He narrowed his eyes in thought. "Actually, that middle one looks a lot like you."

Riku sighed. "How did I know you were going to say that?"

"Well he does!"

"No he doesn't," countered Riku, pointing at the screen. "Kadaj's hair is completely different in both cut and color and his eyes are a totally different green. Yeah, there's some similarity in our general facial structure but that's it."

Sora angled his head and continued to study the one Riku called Kadaj. "Yeah… you're right. He's kinda… reminiscent of you. However they all really look like Sephiroth, same hair color exactly."

"There's a reason for that and it'll get explained later on."

Cloud drove past in the distance and Kadaj gestured with his head for the other two to go. They took off over the cliff in their bikes and gave chase to the blond man. Around them and Cloud, several strange, black monsters appeared from dark grey vapor, seemingly from nowhere.

"Whoa, those show up like Heartless do!"

"Yeah." Riku stretched his arms above his head. "Cloud's got some mad skills to be able to fight off those, Loz and Yazoo and keep Fenirr from wrecking out."

Sora nodded, watching the action with wide eyes. "I don't think I could handle that." Pause. "Did the pretty one just call him 'brother'?"

"The pretty one? You mean Yazoo?"

"Whoever the long-haired one is. Why are they calling Cloud their brother?"

"Because he has Jenova cells." Riku knew that he was going to have to launch into another long explanation. He moved for the remote to pause the film.

"Oh, yeah. So those guys are somehow connected to Sephiroth, obviously, and so since they all have the same cells, they're kinda like siblings… or at least related." Sora glanced at Riku. "Right?"

"Basically, yeah." Riku resettled into the couch.

Sora turned back just in time to see Cloud take a gunshot to the face and both teens winced. "Ow! That had to hurt."

"Well, I suppose it's better than some of the other hits he's taken but still… ow."

The monsters giving chase disappeared into smoke as Cloud's pursuers fell back and he skidded the bike to a halt. He looked up toward the cliff and stared for a moment at Kadaj. The silver-haired man smirked at him and drove off.

"Okay," Sora said slowly. "That seemed… pointless."

"It was as good an introduction to them as anything."

"True."

Fenirr was now making its way up a gravelly road surrounded by lush trees. There was another voice overlay, this time a deep, rough male's calling himself Barrett, talking about finding oil and seeing that Marlene girl. It was immediately followed by Tifa saying some Reno guy called and for Cloud to be careful.

"Wait, wasn't Reno the guy flying the chopper at the beginning?"

"Yeah," Riku nodded. "Think this has anything to do with what they were looking for in the beginning?"

"Probably. I wanna know why those other guys think Cloud has Mother." Sora abruptly turned toward Riku. "Oh, I bet Reno has her! That's probably what they were looking for in that crater!"

The older teen frowned. "Well, that was the Northern Crater and Jenova was there…Did they say they were looking for something? I think I missed that."

"No, but they had to have been there for a reason and if she was there then it totally makes sense." Sora went back to facing the screen. "Still doesn't explain how Cloud fits in but- Hey! Reno just attacked Cloud and Cloud was totally waiting for it! That was cool."

Reno reared back again to make another strike at Cloud and the blond simply stepped out of the way. Reno went skittering out the open door and before he could recover and come back in, Cloud shut it in his face. He then quickly locked it.

"Dude! That is awesome!" Sora smacked his leg. "Cloud totally needs to be more like that."

"Yeah," agreed Riku as Cloud walked further into the room and a bald-headed, tanned Turk moved to confront him. "The emo thing really doesn't suit him at all."

When the large man feinted, Cloud instantly pointed his sword at his neck and the man backed off. Once he did, a wheelchair came into the room occupied by a man covered in a white blanket. The newcomer made a comment about Cloud fighting like the SOLDIER he once claimed to be and Cloud identified him, a short series of flashback images going along with it.

"He should be dead." Riku frowned in confusion. No sooner had Riku said this than Rufus Shinra tried explaining what had happened to him. "Oh. That's…farfetched but okay."

"So wait, he was in a building when it blew up?"

"Yeah. Remember in Marlene's story that big building with the cylinders around it?"

"The one pumping that mako stuff?"

"Yeah, that was Shinra Building and it got trashed during the Meteor thing."

"That was the place that was all wrecked up, right?" Sora asked. When Riku nodded, he scrunched up his face. "How the hell did he make it out of that?"

"Well apparently Cloud isn't going to let us find out." On screen, Cloud was moving to leave but Rufus said something that made the swordsman pause. He turned back toward the man and asked about 'mother'.

"What, did Kadaj say something? There are plenty of kids who miss their mothers…"

"I am really not liking this guy." Sora pursed his lips. "He's just so… condescending toward Cloud and he can't give a straight answer to save his life. How the heck does he expect to get Cloud to help him when he's being a prick?"

"I wouldn't." Riku noted. "The guy's a bastard and has completely fucked up his world. I don't think he's sincere, he's just trying to save his own ass."

"Did you see his hand? I think he's got that stigma thing, too."

"Huh. I can see that. I mean, I think the Planet would have more against him than just about anyone else."

"Yeah."

Cloud looked like he was about to agree to help Rufus but Reno made a comment about rebuilding Shinra and his expression completely changed. He pushed the now cracked open door and walked out, brushing past the redhead with a firm, "not interested." As the door fell back shut, both Rufus and Rude said Reno's name in exasperation.

"Smooth move there, Reno." Riku snorted. "Let's totally bring up the idea of restoring the company responsible for completely screwing up Cloud's life."

"That was really dumb." Sora stood up. "I need a soda, tell me if anything important happens."

"Hurry up." Riku ordered as the younger teen walked off. "And bring me one, too!"

The movie switched over to Tifa and Marlene entering a building that Riku recognized instantly as Aerith's church. The two walked past the pews and came upon a small camp set up. Marlene asked if that was where Cloud was living and Tifa reluctantly confirmed it. When the girl picked up a dirtied white strip of cloth just like the one Denzel had been using in the beginning, Riku shouted. "Hey, Sor! Cloud's got the stigma, too!"

"Seriously?" Sora darted back into the room, tossing Riku a can of soda as he slid before the television. "Now why the heck does he have it? The Planet should love him for everything he did!"

"I have no idea." The silvered teen frowned in thought. "I'm really thinking that the stigma has nothing to do with the Planet. It makes no sense that it would be punishing people, especially innocent kids."

"Yeah, I'm having a hard time with that, too." Sora took a long drink. "Hopefully that will be explained."

Tifa was telling Marlene they were going home and the girl protested, stating that Cloud wasn't there yet. Tifa agreed and said that they all missed him and then randomly asked what they were going to do when he came back. Marlene said they'd all go home together and Tifa modified that with the statement that he would get a lecture first that Marlene instantly agreed with.

"Ookay, that felt random." Sora noted, looking back at Riku. "And if that's what Cloud has to look forward to upon coming home, I don't blame him for not wanting to be there."

Riku nodded. "Yeah. I wouldn't want to be there either."

The scene changed again and went back to Rufus and the Turks. Reno and Rude were lying on the floor in obvious pain as Kadaj casually strolled between them and headed over to Rufus, almost chuckling that he hated liars. This lead into Rufus apologizing and then stating that whatever it was Kadaj was after fell from the helicopter while they were escaping.

"Wait. Didn't he just tell Cloud that they didn't find anything?" Riku scrunched up his face. "Wow, Shinra is just trying to play everyone isn't he?"

"Yeah, well, obviously Kadaj isn't going for it either." Sora commented rather dryly. When Kadaj tossed two cards on the floor at Rufus' feet, he leaned forward to see them better. "Are those id cards?"

Riku also leaned forward a little. "Yeah… those are Tseng and Elena's. Damn, so they were caught in the beginning. I wonder if they're dead."

"Probably." Sora said in a tight voice. "Unless they're going to be held hostage but Kadaj seems to be too insane to consider that an option."

Riku lifted an eyebrow at him. "You think?"

"Yeah." The younger male tilted his head. "Though with how the three of them keep wandering around, unless they have other people helping them, there's a good chance that if Tseng and Elena are alive they'll be able to escape."

Kadaj was going on a rant about Mother and a reunion and then turned and threw out his arms in a grand gesture as he informed Rufus that he and his brothers and sisters would strike back at the planet.

"Hee-hee! It'll be glorious!" Sora giggled in a decent mockery of Kadaj's voice.

Riku snorted out a laugh. "He does look like he should be saying that!"

"He's like… a psychotic child." Sora observed, straightening his neck. "I can't decide if I like him or not."

"Yeah," agreed Riku. "He's definitely getting on my nerves."

Kadaj dropped down in front of Rufus, angling his head down. The picture began shaking a little and flashing between blue-green and red. The actual image became chaotic and odd sounds laced over the music.

"Dude! Rewind it!" Sora leaned forward, suddenly extremely attentive to what was happening onscreen.

"Why?" Riku asked even as he reached for the remote.

"I swear I saw flashes of Sephiroth in there."

Riku sent the DVD back a few frames and started it over. He played it in slow motion and Sora was in fact right. Scattered within the odd picture flashes were random images of Sephiroth. "Okay, that's trippy."

"So obviously, Kadaj is channeling him or something." Sora pursed his lips in thought. "Or, Sephiroth is somehow controlling him. I still have no idea where these three come from though."

"In the game there were these black-hooded guys called Sephiroth clones running around." Riku joined in the musing. "They could be some kind of perfected version of those."

"That would be scary. A bunch of Sephiroth clones running around? One of him is bad enough."

The screen cut back to the hillside and Cloud re-embedding the sword Kadaj had kicked down earlier. It pulled back as he stepped away and gazed at the battered weapon rather sadly. I said I'd live out both our lives…easy to make that promise.

"Who's he talking to?" Sora asked just as it went into a series of scenes with a black-haired man with blue eyes that rivaled Cloud's. First he was in a room, then a close up of his face asking if someone was okay, and then throwing himself forward in the back of what looked like a truck and telling Cloud to run. "Whoa. That was intense and I don't get any of it."

Riku paused the movie just as it returned to Cloud, knowing this explanation was going to get a little long. "That's Zack. He was Cloud's best friend back when he was trying to get into SOLDIER. He died saving Cloud's life."

"Then does he have those cells, too?"

"Yeah, he did. After Sephiroth went crazy, both Cloud and Zack were taken by Hojo to be used as new experiments. They both got cells but were ultimately failures."

"So Hojo let them go?" Sora guessed. His expression clearly expressed that he didn't believe that.

"No, Zack regained consciousness and busted them out." Riku took a drink of soda. "See, the way I understood it, Zack's body overwhelmed the cells and they didn't take to him because of all the mako already in him. Cloud didn't have any mako to begin with and when they did a mass infusion of it along with the cells, it put him in, well, pretty much a coma. He became a listless zombie. It's really sad in the game when you see it. His just stares blankly and his head kinda bobs."

"Why didn't Cloud have any mako? I thought he was one of those SOLDIER guys."

"Naw, he never made it." Riku set his soda can back down. "It gets a bit complicated. Cloud was a cadet but failed his first attempt to get into the program. He became part of the infantry and that's how he met Zack, who was a First Class. They became close and Cloud was going to try to get into SOLDIER again but the whole Nibelheim thing happened."

"Nibelheim?" The younger teen frowned.

"That's where Sephiroth went crazy."

"Oh." Sora nodded in understanding. "And then they were taken by the mad scientist."

"Yeah."

"So, wait. Why did Rufus call him an ex-SOLDIER if he never got in?"

"Uh, well, the easy way to explain it is that after they escaped, they were on the run for awhile. Cloud was in that coma the entire time. Eventually the army caught up with them and Zack tried to hold them off but eventually he was overwhelmed and took a crap-load of bullets to the chest. They left him for dead and assumed Cloud already was.

"Cloud regained awareness, found Zack dead and, well," Riku frowned, trying to figure out the best way to put this which having to get into a psychology lesson. "Cloud's brain was a total mess and he ended up sort of, assuming Zack's life. He took Zack's life and made it into his own."

"That's…really said." Sora's blue eyes grew dark. "I could always tell that he had been through an awful lot and that his depression went a lot further than Sephiroth. It was easy for him to blame Sephiroth for everything but…he really didn't know who he was anymore. Everything he did was influenced by doubt and insecurity and that's what caused his darkness, not Sephiroth."

Riku stared at the brunet for a minute. He wasn't so much amazed that Sora had pieced all of that together because he knew better than anyone that Sora was much smarter than he let on but that the brunet had that much insight into Cloud Strife's psyche. He did not think that he had known the man that well.

Sora turned back to the TV. "He needs some major therapy."

Snorting, Riku unpaused the movie. "I thought so long as you had your light, you would be completely fine."

"Yeah, against the darkness," said Sora. "But Cloud's just a freakin' headcase."

That got Riku laughing so hard that he fell to his side on the couch. He had no idea why he found Sora calling Cloud a headcase so funny but had a pain in his chest by the time he began calming back down. He almost missed Sora's next statement. "What?"

"Cloud just had an arm attack and his eyes went all Sephiroth crazy."

"An arm attack?" Riku gasped, trying to catch his breath.

"Yeah. He's gotta have that stigma thing." Sora's spikes of hair bounced a little as he shook his head. "I swear, I am gonna give him so much flack if he spends this whole movie emoing and having arm attacks."

"What?"

"Yeah! So far, all it's been from him is angst, angst, angst," he suddenly shuddered and held his wrist, "ugh, my arm! Angst, angst…"

Riku was again over on his side. He couldn't even laugh, simply smacking his hand against the cushion. He sat up, nearly crying in amusement. "Do that again."

Sora repeated his imitation and both were howling with laughter. They completely missed the movie going back to Marlene and Tifa at the church. When they finally pulled themselves back together, Loz had walked into the church and was asking where his mother was.

"Man," Sora was still chuckling. "Those three are like a broken record. Where's Mother? Where's Mother? Maybe they should try looking instead of bothering random people."

"Right?" Riku agreed, exhaling as he calmed down. He noticed where the movie was at and grinned. "Oh, this is a kick-ass fight!"

"They're gonna fight?" Sora leaned forward. "With Marlene there?"

"You think Loz cares about that?"

"True." Tifa was pulling on her gloves and taking on a ready stance. "This should be cool. Tifa can do some awesome stuff and she doesn't even use weapons."

"I think she qualifies as a weapon all in herself."

Tifa launched herself at Loz, which he blocked and the fight took off at rapid speed. The two exchanged long series of blows, switching off between which had the upper-hand. Tifa was all over the place while Loz remained fairly stationary, relying in his strength and the odd electric-charged weapon on his wrist.

The boys winced and reacted to every hit the dark-haired woman took, especially when her head hit one of the pews as Loz flung her around. They even grimaced when Loz was taking his beatings from Tifa, getting thrown down onto the stone floor and body slammed several times. The whole thing was more intense than either of them had seen.

"Damn," muttered Sora as Tifa took hold of Loz and literally hurtled him down from a good thirty-feet in the air and into the back section of pews. "I knew she was good but… damn. Remind me to not piss her off."

"There is no way Loz is gonna just get up after that." Riku declared rather confidently. "That fight would have killed me before the first half was over."

"Yeah," Sora said slowly. "I can take a beating but that was…"

Marlene called out Tifa's name and came running toward her. Both obviously agreed with the two viewers that the fight was clearly over. Before the girl fully reached her, a rather victorious sounding medley rang out around them.

"They included that?!" Riku leaned the back of his head against the couch and laughed.

"What is it- Hey! Loz is back up and he looks barely touched! How the heck does that work?"

Riku was more interested that he had pulled out his cell phone and that the music had turned out to be his ringtone. "Oh, I am so getting that for my phone!"

Sora scrunched up his face as he looked at the older teen. "Getting what?"

"That song that just played is the victory fanfare from pretty much all of the series. It plays every time you win a fight." Riku explained, his aqua eyes bright with amusement. "Oh, Tidus and Wakka would flip out if they heard that!"

"I have got to play these games sometime." Sora pouted.

Riku smirked at him. "When you're done playing with yourself."

"You're never gonna get tired of that, are you?"

"Nope."

Back onscreen, Loz was resetting his weapon and then abruptly flung a broken pew at Tifa and Marlene. The little girl ducked as it came at them and Tifa very easily destroyed it with her fist before it could touch Marlene. The splinted and fragmented wood fluttered to the ground as Loz practically teleported toward the woman.

"Oh, he did not just do that!" Sora shouted, getting up on his knees. "What if she had gotten hurt? She can't defend herself!"

"I don't think he cares at this point."

Loz sent a direct charge into Tifa, Marlene watching with huge, scared eyes.

"Oh, he has to die!" Sora snarled out. "You don't do that shit in front of an innocent child!"

"Calm down, Sor." Riku advised, not liking how angry Sora was getting. While he agreed with the younger boy, it wasn't worth getting worked up over it.

Sora was still fuming but he sat back down and watched silently as Tifa was pressed up against a pillar. She hung rather limply in Loz's grip and another charge was sent through her. This one made the stone behind her explode and she was flung back into the bed of flowers.

She didn't get back up.

Marlene backed a few steps away as Loz approached her guardian. Loz walked up to Tifa's semi-conscious form and knelt over it, picking her upper body up by her shirt. He held up his fist at her threateningly.

Before he could do anything further, he was hit in the side of the head by a shiny, greenish object.

"Did-" Riku blinked. "Did Marlene just hit him in the head with a materia?"

"I don't know what that was but go Marlene!" Sora cheered.

The view moved as Loz looked back to find Marlene standing there, a smug expression on her face.

"Well, now she's gone and drawn attention to herself." Riku commented.

"Well, it's not like she could stand there and just let him beat the crap out of Tifa."

"I know."

Loz slowly stood and Marlene quickly grew frightened again. As the bulky man approached her, she huddled in upon herself a little and muttered, "Cloud."

It then quickly flashed back to Tifa, who had barely lifted herself up as she cried out, "Just run!"

The screen then cut to Denzel on the street. His eyes opened wide and he gasped for some reason. A girl with an odd-looking stuffed animal approached him and that was when Riku stopped the movie.

"I'm hungry." He announced.

"I'm disturbed." Sora turned and sat on his knees facing his best friend. "I can't believe he did all of that in front of her. It's like she wasn't even there."

The silver-haired youth shrugged. "They're the bad guys and they're on a mission. All they care about is finding Jenova and it doesn't matter who gets hurt in the process."

"Ugh, I hate people like that." Sora scowled.

"I'm not too fond of them myself," muttered Riku. "At least you didn't spend four months of your life surrounded by them."

"True." Sora pursed his lips. Slapping his hands on his upper legs, he grinned. "We need jalapeño poppers and mozzarella sticks!"

"Sounds good." Riku stood.

"Yeah." Sora hopped up. "And while we're making them, you can explain what the heck that materia stuff is."