On the screen, Cloud jumped down and landed in a submarine room…

"That doesn't look much like the inside of a submarine to me," Zack said.

...if said room were three times as large as it should be with the limited amount of space that should be on the vessel.

"It is rather large," Sephiroth conceded.

"Huh?" Zack asked. "Oh, that's not why for me. It's just that the floor looks all rusted or something. If ShinRa had let it go that far, there wouldn't be anyone bothering to man it."

"You might be surprised," Genesis muttered.

"I think that's the lighting," Angeal remarked with a frown. "It doesn't look like rust to me."

The younger teen scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Really? I mean, I guess I can see that… but then why would they have lighting like that on a submarine? Why have mesh there to begin with? The one guard is standing on it, but that seems kind of dangerous to me…"

He had a point. "It's much like the grating of an industrial catwalk, though it looks far too thin to be safe," Sephiroth said. Not that ShinRa had ever cared much about the safety of their employees. "It looks far more like what one might find in the engine levels of a battleship."

"That would explain it," Angeal said thoughtfully. "The game creators probably couldn't get reference images, so they had to make it up from what they had access to. Submarines are classified top-secret, but people can ask to tour a passenger boat."

"Was gonna say exactly that, actually." Zack looked entirely too proud of his mentor.

That did explain some of what they had seen in the game so far. Like the strangeness of the interior of the Midgar mako reactors early in the game. Sephiroth was fairly sure civilians couldn't tour those.

"So the puppy has some brains after all," Genesis muttered.

"Yeah, I—Hey!" Zack whined. Angeal elbowed the red-head in defense of his student.

Meanwhile, Cloud was fighting the three infantry… or were those underwater military police? Sephiroth still thought the designation was rather ridiculous, but then, it was ShinRa.

He supposed it didn't matter that much. It would normally matter a great deal, especially if they were SOLDIERS as he'd incorrectly concluded a few fights ago, but Sephiroth was trying to remember that this wasn't supposed to represent real life – it was a strange concept he wasn't entirely sure he could comprehend at the moment.

Apparently the others thought similarly as no one else commented.

Once the battle finished (and where did the bodies go, now that he thought about it… surely they couldn't have dissolved into the Lifestream that quickly… why was he already having problems remembering Zack's point about realism), they saved the game at the save point and then walked through the door at the end of the room.

On the other side of the door they found the cockpit. It was far more reasonably sized (as long as one ignored the ceiling height – game logic, he supposed).

Three men (what looked like two infantry and a commander) panicked inside and it looked like they would end up in another fight.

They spoke of their 'victory move'…

"Wait, are those the infantry men from the Victory Parade?" Genesis asked.

"Victory Parade?" Zack interjected.

"A mini game from the first disk," Angeal explained. "The first time we visited Junon."

"Oh," the Puppy said, then nodded.

Then, to Sephiroth's surprise, they got the option to take them prisoner instead of fighting them. The Silver General blinked at the screen as that had never happened in the game before.

"Oh, yeah! That's way better than killing people you know!" Zack said with a grin.

"Does that mean you should kill people you don't know?" Genesis asked, half amused.

Zack looked taken aback. "What? No!"

"We just did," the Commander pointed out, gesturing to the screen.

The Third's eyes narrowed. "Because they were trying to stop us from saving the world!"

"Oh, please," Genesis said, but before he could say anything else, Angeal cut in.

"Maybe having a moral discussion after midnight while playing… this isn't the best idea," he said with a disapproving frown at both his student and his friend. Sephiroth appreciated that Angeal had stepped in so that he didn't have to.

"So should we take them prisoner, then?" Sephiroth finally asked. The more prudent side of him said they shouldn't allow them to live, but he had the suspicion that Zack would be unhappy if they didn't. He didn't want Zack disappointed with him so soon after the boy had said he admired the trio.

"No," Genesis said at the same time Zack said, "Yes!"

"I'm picking 'take prisoner'," Angeal announced, in a clear attempt to stop an argument before it started.

"Really?" Genesis asked and rolled his eyes again.

"I agree with them." Sephiroth shrugged at the red-head, not really wanting to explain his reasoning right now for much the same reason they shouldn't be arguing: it really was just too late after a long day (week) of nasty surprises.

Angeal spoke up, one eyebrow raised in either censure or amusement (or both? Sephiroth wasn't entirely sure). "Sephiroth already agreed to several of your suggestions when he was playing, like using the Steal Materia. It's Zack's turn."

Genesis grumbled about the grinding having been Zack's suggestion too, but didn't protest otherwise.

Angeal picked the prisoner option. And then the ShinRa troops just ran off to the side of the room… and stood there. No fight, no resistance, no text boxes.

The General wasn't the only one who just stared at the screen.

"Weren't they just, you know, ready to fight us?" Zack asked.

"Yes," Genesis said. "Yes, they were."

"So why did they just back down like that?" the Puppy asked.

If the one who knew most about the different shortcuts and limitations of video games and their creation was confused, Sephiroth doubted the rest of them had much of a chance to figure that one out.

So he came to the only logical conclusion.

"Game Stupidity," he said.

Zack turned his confusion on the silver-haired man. "What…" he paused, then looked up and to the right as if rethinking his question. "No, where does that rank in comparison to Game Insanity?"

Angeal chuckled and spoke up. "We have Game Logic – things limited by the game-play that can't really be avoided with what they had to work with when it was made. Then we have Game Insanity, where something that would never logically happen occurs even if the limitations of the game wouldn't have prevented it. Then we have things that are so utterly ridiculous that it makes Game Insanity look sane: thus, Game Stupidity. You have caused us to rethink, re-categorize, and shift a few things in regards to these… terms, though."

Sephiroth stared at Angeal. Genesis did much the same. The General hadn't realized Angeal had quantified their terms. At least not in that way. If he thought about it and applied Angeal's definition, they had been classifying a lot of game logic as game insanity… but his definitions made sense, so perhaps he had a point. Still… had they really needed definitions for that?

Angeal looked back at the two of them, shrugged and mouthed, 'What?'

On the floor, Zack seemed to be contemplating his mentor's words. "Yeah, okay. Thanks, Angeal."

Sephiroth just kept staring and Genesis was shaking his head and mouthing, 'Seriously?"

The larger SOLDIER rolled his eyes and gestured to the screen with the controller. Genesis threw his hands in the air and Sephiroth shook his head before turning back to the screen.

Only to realize Cloud seemed to be panicking, fidgeting with his hands and saying he 'couldn't take it anymore.' Whatever 'it' was. He described the shaking, the roar of the engine, the lack of space…

"Is he claustrophobic?" Genesis asked. "This is news to me."

"Makes sense, though," Zack muttered in a strangely subdued tone. "Especially if he remembers."

Sephiroth glanced at the boy, who was staring ahead at the screen again, very pointedly. Then the three older SOLDIERS exchanged glances. Angeal shook his head, though, recommending they not say anything right now. Sephiroth acknowledged that with a nod. Genesis also seemed to take that advice as he said nothing.

For some reason, Sephiroth felt pleased with the red-head… proud even? Hmm… Why?

Before he could contemplate further, Tifa spoke up, pointing out that they stole a submarine without knowing how to pilot it. Yuffie, who seemed to be having just as rough of a time as Cloud, ran towards the controls as the screen began to shake and pulse red.

Then she said it was moving.

"I'm… rather sure submarines are more difficult to direct out of dock than that…" Genesis said slowly and sarcastically.

Then Yuffie turned around and faced Cloud. 'Oh man, this sucks! Cloud, do something!'

"What is he supposed to do?!" Genesis asked, holding his hand out at the screen in disbelief.

And then, because of course, Cloud just stood up, said he felt a little better when he drove.

And that was that.

"That's how they get him to drive?" Genesis groaned. "That's how they get him to not feel sick?!"

"He… really does do this all the time, doesn't he," Sephiroth heard Zack whisper to Angeal in regards to the red-head. Genesis shot them both an annoyed glance.

That didn't seem to stop a smirking Angeal. "Yes. Yes, he does."

"You dare?!" Genesis yelled, mock offended. At least, Sephiroth thought he was mock offended. However, perhaps he should step in… just in case.

He cleared his throat and pointed to the screen where Angeal had briefly gotten back control, triggered another text box, and picked the first option of the menu that came up. 'Read the manual.'

"I believe this constitutes as a mini-game?" he directed his comment to Zack.

The boy nodded. "Yeah, probably."

No one else commented after that, even though Genesis pouted. Sephiroth still counted his intervention as a success. (The Commander also dropped it rather quickly, so Sephiroth was sure the 'indignation' was indeed a false front.)

It didn't take the Silver General long to memorize the directions that popped up, though he waited silently as everyone did the same.

"Most definitely a mini game," Zack amended.

Then 'mission orders' about escorting the 'Red Leader' submarine came up as well. Then it informed them that mines had been placed on the ocean floor. Because it was ShinRa and they didn't do things like this by half. Then it talked about the submarine's radar screen and continued in that vein for a while.

After a couple more screens that felt more like instructions than mission orders, it turned on its head and gave Cloud the objective to 'sink' the Red Submarine ship carrying the Huge Materia. And then it gave advice. On sinking the other ship.

What?

Beside him, Genesis was silently seething at the screen. Angeal was keeping his face blank, while Zack was somewhere between doubt and disbelief.

Finally, the original menu came back, asking if they wanted to read the manual, sit in the seat or leave it alone.

Angeal chose to sit in the seat with only a short complaint. "I don't like it, but I'm guessing this is another case of the game forcing us."

"It… might be a failable mission. And we did just save," Zack said, then slumped a little, as if disappointed. "But I know we're also on a time limit, and experimenting would probably take more time than finishing the minigame the way they want."

A couple more preparatory screens later (with what looked like Cloud turning the whole thing on with the push of a button – very much not how submarines were started, Sephiroth was sure) the scene changed. On the screen, a blue fish-like structure and a similar red one were moving… and whirling. Or, more accurately, the camera seemed to be spinning around them. That seemed… counter intuitive.

It didn't even take Angeal two minutes of their ten minute time limit to sink the ship.

"Is it just me, or was that too easy?" Genesis asked.

"It's not just you," the mentor in their group said, sounding contemplative, while his mentee just nodded his head emphatically.

After the 'Mission Complete' screen vanished, the victory theme sounded as the cockpit came back into view. The battle victory music played and a box appeared at the top of the screen saying that the group 'Received ShinRa sub'.

"And they ignore the logistics of owning a submarine," Genesis said with an exasperated sigh.

"What do you mean?" Zack asked, genuinely curious.

The commander must have sensed the curiosity because he only hesitated a moment before answering.

"Submarines require an immense amount of upkeep due to the fact that they are built for traveling under water. Between rust, mineral build-up and the limited space, a dock is completely necessary – which I doubt they'll have, by the way. That doesn't even take into consideration fuel consumption as no travel time in this game is remotely correct, but that would need to be taken into account along with maps of the underwater ocean for currents and canyons to avoid…"

Zack looked a little surprised. "Wow," he finally said.

"Exactly," Genesis replied, all of his previous annoyance gone, replaced with a preen.

"The travel-time is definitely Game Logic, though," Zack added. "Backtracking is annoying."

The blue box on the screen said that the Huge Materia should be at the bottom of the ocean.

And then they received a message to all ShinRa vessels. Once Cloud responded that everything was 'normal' on theirs, they told him to return to dock and escort the Huge Materia from the airport at Junon…

"Didn't we just sink that?" Zack asked.

"When did they remove it from the sub?!" Angeal asked.

"Why would they pretend to put it on a submarine in the first place if they planned to go by air?" Sephiroth asked. That just seemed so… over the top.

"Turks," was all Genesis said in response, his tone dark. As if that explained everything.

To be fair, it really did.

However, there was one more explanation. "Unless… ShinRa did have two different Huge Materia," Sephiroth pointed out.

"So you think it's a second materia?" Zack asked.

"Potentially," Sephiroth said. "We will likely find out later."

The screen switched to a view of the submarine under water. It was completely different than before.

"Is that even the same submarine?" Genesis asked.

"I… think so," Angeal responded slowly, sounding extremely unsure.

"Game Insanity," the red-head muttered.

"Have... many of the mini games had even worse graphics than usual?" Zack asked, face scrunched in puzzlement. "Because that was a lot of stuff on screen and older game consoles have a hard time animating a lot of models or textures at the same time. Too much can make games lag or crash."

Sephiroth recalled the mini game at Fort Condor. "Yes. You mentioned hardware limitations before we boarded the submarine."

"Yeah," Zack replied, but didn't elaborate.

So, a case of game limitations, rather than Insanity. Sephiroth remained quiet. If Angeal wanted to work game limitations into his hierarchy, fine, but Sephiroth wasn't going to contribute to definitions now that he knew Angeal had been quantifying them into a list. At least not tonight. Later, perhaps.

Everyone read the instructions, then Angeal pushed the button that would have the submarine float to the surface. It, unrealistically, shot upwards, and the screen faded out. After a moment, it faded back in to the map they were familiar with, but showed them in the water. The sub immediately turned right and entered an unnatural-looking cove. A man-made-bay? Cloud got out and they read yet another menu that popped up, informing them how they could get onto and off of the submarine. It was much like the other vehicles they'd acquired throughout the game

"Oh, yes," Genesis said as he put a hand to the bridge of his nose. "Because there are always random bays or docks built all over the world. This game is so ridiculous."

"This is definitely Game Logic, though," Zack said matter-of-factly. "You have to be able to take the submarine where you need to go, so they had to make sure people could get out where they needed to. In real life, people would probably just use whatever they can find… I suppose? Or maybe sneak into a couple of docks? Have someone stay with the submarine?"

It still seemed ridiculous to Sephiroth.

In any case, he just shook his head as Angeal ran towards Junon… again.

"Hey, before you go in, isn't that Cid guy a pilot?" the SOLDIER Third spoke up suddenly. Angeal lifted his fingers from the controller.

"Yes," Angeal said, looking about as confused as Sephiroth felt.

"Well, we're going after an airplane. Maybe having him in our party would be a good thing."

The other SOLDIERS didn't answer for several seconds as they thought over that.

"It has… never seemed to matter before," Sephiroth said.

"Not that you know," Zack corrected, a smile back on his face. "It's pretty common in RPGs that if you don't have a certain member in your party at a certain point, you can miss out on things like weapons or gear. Sometimes even plot points."

Oh. "How would we know if we missed something?" And what did 'RPGs' stand for?

"You don't. Usually, things like branching paths are found out from multiple play-throughs, either by one player on their own, or by a lot of players making their own choices but discussing it in a group or something, like the fanclub newsletters. You can discover a lot of different routes that way. Most gamers and game makers call it 'replayability'. Companies want you to play their stuff more than once. The more you enjoy a game, the more likely you are to buy another one made by the same guys. Like that game I was playing in the hall? I've ended up having a completely different experience on the second and third runs because of how I've built my monster team each time. I like it, it's fun, and that's not the first game in that series I've bought or played. Same for the Lezda series I mentioned."

Sephiroth was unsure if he wanted to ask Zack to elaborate on the new terms (they didn't have the time), so he stayed quiet, but he did scribble them into his notebook.

"That would have been nice to know a week ago," Genesis grumbled. Sephiroth completely agreed. Even Angeal looked a little put out at that.

Though, even if they had known it likely wouldn't have changed much. Knowing there was a different path… well the only place where it would have made a difference that was worth the time was… Sephiroth glanced at Zack. He doubted having a different person in the party would have changed a single thing about Aerith's death. The two times they'd had to reload after a defeat thus far, changed nothing but the team surviving.

"Alright. Any objections to swapping out Yuffie?" Angeal asked after a glance at Genesis and Sephiroth. Yuffie's 'stats' had gotten high enough, he supposed, so he shook his head. Genesis shrugged, so Angeal switched her out for Cid, equipped them all and then walked into Junon.

They paid another 10 gil to get back onto the elevator and saved the game at the save point once he reached the top.

"The airport is out the open door at the top left of the screen, right?" Angeal asked.

Sephiroth thought back to when they'd explored Junon before and both he and Genesis nodded. "Yes." So Angeal had Cloud move in that direction. Just as they ran out onto the deck, a large plane painted in army camouflage colors took off.

"Aw, man! We missed it!" Zack said angrily.

On the screen, Cid said that of course they'd go after it. He either really hated ShinRa at the moment, or he'd gotten swept up in their whole quest and seemed rather invested. Or, at least more so than when he'd joined the group.

Tifa asked where they were headed. Cloud said 'Rocket Town, of course'!

That… was actually a decent conclusion. For once.

"Back to the Highwind, then." Angeal commented and then hurried them out of the area and back down the elevator (not without a couple of fights on the way, of course) and then out to the airship.

xXx

A/N (this time with peanuts from the beta-gallery): Slightly shorter chapter than most, but the wait has been long enough, so this is a surprise midweek update.

Imagination7413 also wants to pass on an apology for taking so long to finish the beta of this chapter, and insists the long delay is entirely her fault. (Obi does not agree and insists she has some blame too, but yeah.)

Both are happy to have this chapter done and behind them. (Truth)

Have an Omake!

xXx

*After Genesis complained one too many times*

"If you wanted to make the decisions, perhaps you should have offered to take the controller," Sephiroth pointed out.

"Maybe I will!" Genesis held out an open hand to take it while glaring at Sephiroth.

Angeal snickered, but didn't hand it over. Instead, he held it up in offer and raised an eyebrow while looking at Sephiroth, clearly looking to antagonize Genesis. Zack snickered too, but didn't seem as comfortable with poking fun at the Commander.

Genesis noticed that the controller hadn't been set in his hand and turned to look at his friend. Since Angeal was still offering up the controller, Genesis reached to grab it.

In a moment of impulse, Sephiroth snagged it first. He'd not keep it long, but he'd take the momentary offer to lighten the mood. Poking at a gaping Genesis was only a bonus. Of course.

xXx

AN2: Thanks to both Imagination and Quathis on this.

Discord: discord. gg/xDDz3gqWfy (no spaces)