Disclaimer: Ich bekenne mich nicht Verw'fcsten T'fpfer oder Endfantasie.

Sirius: That's German, isn't it?

Very good, Sirius. Have a cookie.

Sirius: Oooh! Cookie!

Harry: Just like a little kid...

Well, with a name like 'Sirius,' he has to be immature.

Harry: Say, am I ever going to get a Materia in this arc?

In this chapter, yeah. In fact, it will be one that fits your personality like a glove.

Harry: In that case, I'm not sure I really want it.

Well, it does reduce the damage you take from a physical attack. Sort of trade off for what it enables you to do, I guess.

Harry: And what is it?

That's the surprise.


"Ha, ha...They're looking for me again," Aeris laughed darkly.

"You mean it's not the first time they've been after you?" Harry asked incredulously.

"...No."

"They're the Turks," Cloud remarked.

"Hmmm..."

"The Turks...They're an organization in Shinra. They scout for possible candidates for SOLDIER," Cloud explained.

"This violently? I thought they were kidnapping someone," Aeris replied.

The spiky-haired blonde nodded. "They're also involved in a lot of dirty stuff on the side...Spying, murder...you know."

"They look like it," Harry agreed. "Say, why were they after you anyway, Aeris? There must be some reason, right?"

"No, not really," Aeris replied, not meeting their eyes. "I think they believe I have what it takes to be in SOLDIER!"

She's lying. Or at least, not telling the complete truth, Harry thought; he didn't need his threadbare skills in Legilimency to figure this out. She's hiding something...but what?

Before Harry could press the issue, however, Cloud said, "Maybe you do. You want to join?"

"I don't know..." the flower girl admitted. "But I don't want to get caught by THOSE people!"

"Then, let's go!" Cloud urged, standing up. Harry and Aeris climbed to their feet and hopped along the tops of crumbled buildings after the purple-clad mercenary. Harry, being in better physical shape, kept up with Cloud fairly well. They had stop, because...

"Wait! Wait, I said!" Aeris, huffing and puffing, was several hops behind them. She carefully judged each gap before jumping them, and finally caught up a minute later. "Puff...wheeze...Slow...down...Don't leave me..."

"Funny," Cloud mused, smirking, "I thought you were cut out to be in SOLDIER?"

"Oh, you're terrible!" Aeris pouted, causing Harry and Cloud to laugh. It was a few minutes before they calmed down, at which time, the flower girl said, "Hey...Cloud. Were you ever in SOLDIER?"

Cloud thought it over for a moment. "I used to be. How did you guess?"

"Your eyes. They have a strange glow."

"That's the sign of those who have been infused with Mako. A sign of SOLDIER." Cloud looked at the flower girl carefully. "But, how did you know about that?"

"...Oh, nothing!" Aeris replied, cheerfully.

"Nothing...?" Harry mused.

"Right! Nothing! Come on! Let's go, bodyguard!"

The trio jumped across several rooftops before Cloud found a path down to the ground. A few minutes later, the three of them safely set foot upon a path comprised of loose dirt. "Phew!" Aeris panted. "Finally made it off! Now what..." She looked around, taking in her surroundings, before pulling Harry and Cloud forward. "My house is over here. Let's hurry before they get here!"

Harry found himself in a slum, not unlike the neighborhood around Tifa's bar. A huge television screen was mounted on a massive wall, and was set to some sort of twenty-four news programme. To his right, Harry noticed a Materia shop. To his left, he saw a weapon shop.

Aeris led them through the slums to a singular house behind it. A huge flower garden glowed green in the light of a magical-looking waterfall. "Whoa!" Harry gasped.

"It's nice, isn't it?" Aeris said sadly.

"What's wrong? This place is really nice," Harry observed.

"It's nothing. Just..." the flower girl trailed off, shaking her head. "Never mind. Come on in."

She opened the door and led them inside. She called out, "I'm home, Mom." A middle-aged, brown-haired woman came into the living room where they stood, clad in a green dress and a white apron. For her apparent age, Harry noted that she looked beautiful...in that dignified kind of way.

Aeris gestured toward Harry. "This is Harry, a friend I met today." She turned toward Cloud. "And this is Cloud, my bodyguard."

Aeris' mother, who was in the middle of introducing herself to Harry (her name was Elmyra) turned to her daughter in shock. "Bodyguard!? You mean you were followed again? Are you all right? You're not hurt, are you?" Harry was vividly reminded of Mrs. Weasley, and how she fussed over all her kids (Harry and often Hermione were often included in this, much to their chagrined embarrassment).

"I'm all right, Mom," Aeris reassured the woman. "I had Cloud with me."

"Oh, so I don't even get a mention?" Harry protested, feigning grave insult. Aeris giggled at him.

Elmyra nodded. "Thank you, Cloud and Harry." She smiled at them, sadly, before turning and re-entering the kitchen.

Aeris turned to the boys. "So, what are you two going to do now?"

"Is Sector 7 far from here?" Harry asked. "I need to get back."

"I want to go to Tifa's bar," Cloud agreed.

Aeris leaned forward toward the spiky blonde, inquisitively. "If Tifa...a girl?"

Cloud nodded. "Yeah."

"A girl...friend?"

"Girlfriend?" Cloud repeated, momentarily speechless. He shook head vigorously. "No way!"

The flower girl giggled. "Hee hee hee...You don't have to get THAT upset..." She stood straight again. "Well, that's...nice. Let's see...Sector 7? I'll show you the way."

Cloud immediately protested. "You gotta be kidding! Why do you want to put yourself in danger all over again?"

"It's no big deal. I'm used to it," Aeris replied, shrugging.

"'Used to it'?" Harry repeated.

"Well, I don't know..." Cloud mused, "getting help from a girl and all..."

Bad move, Cloud, Harry had time to think before Aeris snapped at the mercenary, very nearly slapping the blonde in feministic fury.

"A girl! What do you mean by that!? You expect me to just sit by and listen, after hearing you say something like that!?" She turned around and stormed to the kitchen door. "Mom! I'm taking Cloud and Harry to Sector 7. I'll be back in a while." Satisfied, the flower girl stomped back over and glared at the blonde.

Elmyra looked in on them from the kitchen, an expression of worry on her face. "But dear..." she sighed, giving in. "I give up. You never listen once you've made up your mind. But if you must go, why don't you go tomorrow? It's getting late now," she reasoned, motioning toward the clock on the wall.

Aeris thought it over, nodding. "Yeah, you're right, Mom."

"Aeris, please go and make the bed," Elmyra requested. The flower girl did as she was told, climbing up the stairs along the back wall of the living room.

"That glow in your eyes...You're from SOLDIER, right?" Elmyra addressed Cloud.

Cloud nodded. "Yeah. Rather I used to be..."

"...I don't know how to say this, but...Would you please leave here, tonight? Without telling Aeris?" the woman asked. Cloud nodded, seeming to understand some unspoken reason that Harry didn't catch. He went upstairs to talk to Aeris, leaving Harry alone with the flower girl's mother.

"Er..." Harry wasn't sure how to frame his question. He eventually settled on being straightforward. "Why do you want us to leave without her? I mean, I don't want her to put herself in needless danger, either..."

Elmyra looked at him slowly. "You seem like a nice, innocent boy, Harry. I don't want to be the one to cause your innocence to wither."

Harry frowned. "I...don't think you have to worry about that. I've had a hard lot in life for a while."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean-"

"No, it's okay. I think I've got it all figured out now," Harry explained. "But if you really don't want to talk about it, I won't press you for it."

Aeris' mother sighed in relief. "I'd really not. Thank you for understanding, Harry." She looked up at him. "I'm afraid we'll be out of beds with Cloud here as well. Is the couch okay with you?"

Harry nodded. "It's fine. Better than some of the other things I've slept on. If you don't mind, though, I'd like to walk outside for a bit."

"Go right ahead, Harry."

Harry stepped outside and crossed the little wooden bridge. He carefully stepped through the long-stemmed flower, admiring the scenery. He stumbled, however, when his foot came down on something hard and round. Harry stooped down and picked it up.

"A Materia orb," Harry breathed. It was a dark purple, signifying it as an Independent Materia. Harry gripped the orb a bit more tightly to get a better look, but it flashed and knowledge came to his mind.

Cover...a Materia that lets the user take a physical attack for a nearby ally. To help compensate for the extra damage, injury is reduced and the user's dexterity is increased slightly.

Huh, Harry thought. He wasn't completely thrilled with the prospect of taking more attacks (he counted himself lucky not to have been seriously hurt so far), but the extra defense and dexterity made up for that. Harry recalled the words Cloud had said about his Counterattack Materia.

"Independent Materia, like this Counterattack, enables a specific ability in the user. It's completely possible, with enough training and skill, to Counterattack without this Materia; it's just a lot easier to have it."

Thinking objectively, Harry realized that there were times, when fighting Death Eaters, that he'd pushed Ron or Hermione out of the way of in coming spell they hadn't seen and taken it himself; they'd done the same to him just as often. On the other hand, spells were more easily reversible than getting stabbed in the stomach with a sword or shot in the arm with a gun.

Harry shrugged. Perhaps, with the extra agility, he could Cover someone and dodge the attack at the same time. He brought up his right hand and, gripping the orb with his left, pushed it into the first slot.

Harry immediately noticed that his movements felt a little more fluid; while he wasn't as graceful as, say, a cat or a lithe athlete, he wasn't clumsy, either. He also felt a bit more...protected, for lack of a better word. As though someone trying to stab him with a knife wouldn't score quite as deep with the blade as normal.

Harry looked at the orb set into the slot on his glove. It twinkled innocently, yet Harry could feel a soft gentleness coming from it all the same time. Looking closely, Harry also noticed that the slot he'd pushed the Cover Materia into had lines that connected it to the next one over. Are these slots...linked together?

Resolving to ask Cloud about it later, Harry headed back toward the house, satisfied with his find. When he entered, he found the couch piled with blankets and pillows. Shrugged, Harry laid Gryffindor's Sword on the floor before the couch, slid the edge underneath the couch so no one (including himself) would step on it and hurt themselves, removed his trainers and slid underneath the covers. He fell asleep shortly afterward.


"The screen's black again! And that creepy music is playing!" Ron grumbled.

"That just means everyone in the game is sleeping, Ron," Hermione sighed. By some miraculous stroke of luck, Ron didn't charm the cases of the games, and the booklets inside them were preserved. She and Ginny were currently looking through the one marked 'Final Fantasy VII' while Tonks was skimming through the booklet for 'Final Fantasy VIII.'

"I still don't see how those people can call thirty seconds a 'full night's sleep,'" Ron shot back.

"Ron, it may only be thirty seconds to us, but to them, it's at least a full eight hours," Ginny said.

Hermione's head shot up. "Wait, does that mean that Harry will age in there?"

"It's possible," Remus mused. "It's also possible that when he gets back, he'll be as old as he would be had he lived here for all the hours he spends in there. It's just as possible that, when he gets back, he'll be the same age as when he left."

"That's too many possibilities, Remus," Tonks teased. "You're also being awfully optimistic. That's not like you."

Remus shrugged. "Well, you do rub off on people, Nymphadora."

When Tonks didn't snipe at Remus, Hermione, Ron, and Ginny all looked at her oddly. "What?" she asked. "I know I've always told people to not call me that, but Remus makes sound...dignified, somehow." Remus snorted. "'Course, he's the only one who can get away with it," the Metamorphmagus added with an evil eye toward the others.


Sirius: You were right, Cor. That 'Cover' Materia fits Harry.

Like a glove, I tell you.

Harry: Oi! You'd take attacks for those you love too, and you know it!

If I could, yeah. I'm not gonna say I'll always be able to, but I'd like to think that I could. Besides, there are some things you shouldn't shield your children from, because if you do, you're over-protecting them, which means they won't have the best skills to use in coping with disappointment and hostility. Some things you have to learn through suffering through the situations in which those things are best suited for.

Sirius: Did you learn that in a self-help book or something?

No, it's actually something I thought about myself several months ago. I think I still have the nice little essay I whipped up about it on my computer here, somewhere.