"Ms. Lane!" Verna woke up with someone shaking her. "Thank goodness you awoke. There are some people who would like to take a rest, so I thought you should know."
"Huh?" Verna rubbed her eyes and looked at the old woman. "Alright."
"I'm going to let them in, if that's alright," The old woman paused and looked at her. "You look like you could use a shower. If you go down the hall to the left you'll find the restroom. Go ahead and wash up there, deary. If you'd like I'll wash your clothes and leave you a fresh change of clothes. Your boss managed to send you some. Oh, and I'll also leave you a towel to use!"
Verna tried to process everything that the old lady was telling her. Absent mindedly she nodded and shifted her legs so they were dangling over the bed's side. She then stood up. Finally, she realized what the lady said, so she quickly made her way to the bathroom.
Gently, Verna closed the door so she wouldn't make that much noise. Verna quickly stripped from her clothing and placed them on the counter, so they were somewhat folded. Quickly, Verna glanced at her reflection. Her face was covered in dirt – most likely courtesy of the chocobo farms. Under the dirt, however, she was still rather pale. Living in Midgar would do that to anyone. There wasn't any sunlight, after all. Her eyes trailed down her body. She was average, nothing special. Sighing she looked back up to her eyes. That was the only attribute about her physical appearance that she actually liked.
Her eyes were green with a blue ring on the outside. Perhaps her eyes were blue with an inner green ring. She couldn't be certain. Still, she enjoyed her eyes, even when others called her freaky for having them. She didn't mind, being different was something to treasure.
Noting that the elderly woman would return soon, Verna jumped into the shadow and hid behind the curtain. She then turned on the water. A string of curses flew out her mouth as she was met with chilly water. Verna hugged the tile wall, refusing to let the water touch her. However, as the steam started to appear she eased herself into the water. Sighing, she felt blissful as the dirt was removed from her skin.
After a few minutes she heard the door open and then closed. Verna poked her head from behind the shower curtain to see a change of clothes and a towel. Realizing she was in the shower long enough, she turned off the water and got out. She quickly wrapped the towel around her body before examining the clothes in front of her. Her eye twitched, was this a soldier's uniform?
"What on Gaia is he thinking?!" Verna yelled at the clothes. "Shiva! Can't he realize that I don't want people thinking I'm a part of Shin-Ra!?"
"Is everything alright in there, deary?" The elderly woman sounded from behind the door.
"Peachy!" Verna replied through gritted teeth. "I just have to call my boss and tell him how much I appreciate the new clothes!" Sarcasm was a venomous leech stuck to her words.
The old lady chuckled and walked away. Verna sighed and dried off before putting on the new clothes. She glanced at the mirror. In these clothes one couldn't tell if she was a male or female. She better just keep her mouth shut so others wouldn't realize who she was. After all, females aren't allowed to be soldiers. If they want to be in the war they could be behind the scenes; snipers, medics, engineers, Turks even. Though, they couldn't be soldiers.
Verna walked out of the bathroom and into the main room. There, she was met with a sudden movement. A barrage of weapons was pointed at her. Her eyes widened and she stumbled backwards.
"Wh-what's going on!?" Verna held her hands in front of her.
She peaked through her hands and noticed there were several people in the room. A girl held her fists up, while another held out a staff. A weird dog growled at her. A man pointed his hand at her, and upon closer inspection it was a gun. Wait, didn't she meet him at Kalm!? Then, her eyes landed on a foreign weapon of a girl with shorter hair.
"Yuffie?" Verna questioned the young ninja.
Yuffie lowered her weapon and narrowed her eyes, "Is that you Verna?"
Verna lifted her hood from her face. Yuffie dropped her weapon and ran over to hug the girl. This very action caused everyone else to lower their weapons. Verna awkwardly patted the girl on the back. She never received hugs, so she wasn't exactly sure what to do in this sort of situation.
"What are you doing here, Yuffie?"
"I could be asking you the same thing! Did the tourist bus end up here?"
"Yeah," Verna nodded. "I managed to ditch them." She then glanced at the rest of the weapon wielders. "Interesting friends you have."
"Yup!" Yuffie let go of Verna and nodded enthusiastically. "I was just so awesome that they just had to ask me to join them! This is AVALANCHE by the way!"
"I know," Verna smirked as Yuffie became puzzled. "I ran into him at Kalm. He didn't deny being a part of AVALANCHE when I asked him. Of course he thought I was a Turk at the time. How do you like my new disguise?"
"Are you some sort of damn Shin-Ra wanna be?" The man questioned in an angry tone.
"On the contrary," Verna crossed her arms. "I'm writing a series of news articles on Sephiroth and Shin-Ra." She managed to leave out AVALANCHE. "I work for an underground newspaper, so Shin-Ra's already after me. To make matters worse I snuck into Shin-Ra headquarters the night after President Shinra was killed by Sephiroth."
"So you know it was him?" The girl in a pink dress questioned.
"It doesn't take a master mind to figure that one out," Verna rolled her eyes. "Anyways, I'm Verna, Verna Alm. But if you read my paper I'm Elizabeth Lane."
"Nice to meet you," the girl with a white top smiled. "I'm Tifa. Grumpy over there," she motioned to the man with the gun on his arm. "Is Barrett."
"I'm Aerith," The girl in the pink dressed grinned.
"Rex XIII."
"Yuffie!" Yuffie jumped up just seemingly wanting to be a part of the conversation.
Suddenly, music began to play, causing everyone to jump at the unexpected noise. Verna glanced towards the window and at the upper city. There was something going on, that's for sure. Perhaps Rufus has arrived. Her eyes widened. Her boss was going to kill her if she didn't get there to write a news story for it.
"I have to get my things and go! It was nice speaking with you!" Verna made a movement to go to the bedroom, but was stopped at the sudden noise.
"Wait!" Tifa called for her, "You're going after Rufus, right?"
Verna glanced back at her and nodded, "Yeah. I need a news story for him."
Tifa smiled, "Your uniform gave me an idea. We could sneak onto the ship that he's going to take to get to Costa del Sol. We could all get on the ship. Are you in?"
Verna took a moment or two to think things over. Smiling, she nodded. This would be better. After all, everyone would write a story about Rufus in Junon. If she could get a more interesting story things would be better.
"Great, I'll just go wake Cloud up," Tifa paused. "He's our friend. Your things are in the bedroom, right? You can come with me."
"Alright," Verna followed the girl.
"So why are you writing this story?" Tifa questioned and looked at her with a serious expression.
"Sephiroth was my hero…I want to say he still is, but I ran into him at Kalm. He tried to kill me."
"I hate Sephiroth."
"What?" Verna looked at the girl. "Why?"
Tifa glanced at her and sighed, "He killed my father and almost everyone else who lived in Nibleheim."
"So he was responsible for that?" Verna looked at Tifa slightly shocked. "I wasn't sure if it was true…But after everything's that happened." She frowned.
Tifa smiled lightly, "Sorry to ruin your mood."
"No, it's fine," Verna nodded. "The truth may hurt, but if one doesn't know the truth it will hurt even further down the road."
"I wish I could tell him that…" Tifa whispered to no one. Not wanting to pry Verna didn't bother asking her what it was about. The two then grabbed their things and woke up a man with a natural bed head.
Verna glanced at the members of AVALANCHE. They were all wearing disguises. Most of them were sailors, but Aerith and Cloud were dressed in a soldier uniforms. Verna held in a laugh at Red XIII as he clumsily attempted to walk like a human. At best he looked like a drunk person.
"Hey, you!" Verna froze as someone yelled at her. She turned around and pointed at herself. "Yes, you!" A soldier in a red uniform came storming up to her, "You ditching the parade?" The man sneered causing Verna to gulp, "Come with me!"
She glanced as the group she's temporarily joined as they watched nervous. As the man dragged her away they realized there was nothing they could do without bringing attention to themselves, so they ran off.
"You're going to watch over the President as your punishment!" The man ordered.
Verna's eyes widened. She wanted to get on the ship and have a better news story, but she most certainly did not want to be this close to the new president. Her cover had the potential to be blown. She nodded hesitantly, she couldn't say anything, or else her cover would definitely be blown.
-A/N—
I know, it's sexist that they can't be soldiers. However, after looking at our history, women are just now able to become soldiers. Like…This year…In the United States that is. So I figured if Final Fantasy VII came out in 1997, then it would be safe to say that women couldn't be soldiers.
Yes, I'm having the Cetra's name be Aerith and not Aeris. In most games it is Aerith…Just in the original – due to a mistranslation – it's Aeris.
Please R&R…Reno and Rude… _ Actually…Rate and review…