It's another Norco Fanction!! That is, a fiction by Norco.
I own nothing, except for my computer, the clothes on my person, and my sanity. 
Sometimes not even that...
norco@fantasysquare.com

End of Battle; Start of War -- Chapter 1.

It had been at least a week since Cloud Strife had defeated Sephiroth in the 
dark bowels of the Northern Crater. It had also been at least a week since he 
saw the huge meteor that Sephiroth had summoned with the black materia homing in 
on Midgar until the Lifestream's, and Aeris', powers had come to save the day. 
And now, he was bored. 
	
Basically, Midgar was a disaster area. The Meteor had pulled within several 
hundred meters of Midgar, and now, Midgar's sister city, Junon, was assisting 
with the cleanup. The casualties were pretty heavy, when looking at the topic 
from a human perspective, well over five thousand. However, when one changed to 
the industrial view, one saw the casualties were light, considering that most 
people were outside of Midgar. Cloud shook his head wearily, his right eat 
gentlty brushing against the tip of the handle on the Buster Sword, the sword 
that Zack had held as the Shinra Troops gunned down one of the escaped 
specimens, and left the other for dead. 
  "Penny for your thoughts?" came a gentle melodic female voice from behind him. 
Cloud turned to see Tifa Lockheart striding towards him. "You left your 
quarters, and I had just finished my watch on the bridge when I came by to see 
you. You weren't there," she said. The last comment, Cloud decided, was totally 
unesscessary. 
  "I was thinking about how bored I am," Cloud said, voicing only the most 
easily verbalised of his thoughts. "So," he said with a playful grin, "where's 
my penny?"
  "Ooops, sorry; I only have gil. Too bad," Tifa said, returning the playful 
smile. 
  "Actually, I dislike this constant flying around in the Highwind," Cloud 
explained, another of the most easily verbalised reasons popping out of his 
mouth.
  "If you don't like it, then go talk to Cid. I'm sure he'd be quite willing to 
let you off at Junon to be fed to the ravenous crowd that passes for Shinra 
Media." Tifa said dryly. The image of himselft dangling off the side of the 
Highwind with ravenous journalists nipping at his heels made Cloud smile thinly. 
"Come on; let's go. I'm getting cold and motion sickness up here," Tifa said 
shivering. Cloud nodded, and together, they wandered down to the lower decks of 
the Highwind. The place seemed almost dead, now that most of the crewers were 
alseep. Because of serious space restrictions, everyone was bunked together in 
groups of two. Barrret Wallace had consistently complained and grumbled about 
being put with Cait Sith. Barret had never really liked the overstuffed 
Mog/Creature combination, which had been made even worse when Cait Sith had 
traitorously given the Key to Temple of the Ancients to Shinra officers. 
Barret's dislike for Cait Sith had grown to planet-sized proportions, when he 
found out that Cait Sith, or Reeve, rather, since it was he who controlled Cait 
Sith, had taken his daughter Marlene as a hostage to ensure his safety and their 
co-operation. By the luck of the draw, he and Tifa had been put in the same 
room. Or, Cloud thought as they stepped towards their room, nost so lucky. The 
Ninja from Wutai, Yuffie, was in control of the draw. Being at that age, when 
girls became master matchmakers of the universe, Yuffie most probably rigged the 
computer system to set up the rooms. Cid, being the captain of the Highwind, got 
the Stateroom converted into a Master Bedroom. It was no secret what he was 
doing in those long hours when he wasn't on the Bridge. Cloud had long ago 
decided, that Cid was most probably babysitting Marlene, and the reason he 
didn't let the others know was that he didn't want to show that he had a soft 
spot. That soft spot had been kept under tight rein all the time that Cloud had 
known him. To his mild surprise, Vincent Valentine; their resident enigma-
number-one, and Barret were waiting for him.
  "Yo, Cloud, we gotta get off this ship!" Barret growled in greeting. "Your 
spikey headed-ass ain't doin' nuthin to get us anywhere! We're just flyin' in 
circles!"
  "Yes," Vincent agreed, casting a dubious glance at Barret. "We need some 
activity. There are, after all, still those giant weapons floating around the 
world. We could go and take those things on." Cloud had thought that whatever 
Vincent was going to say, it would be calm, well thought out and simple. He had 
also thought that Vincent's statement would balance against Barret's outrageous 
one. He was wrong. 
  "ARE YOU MAD??," Yuffie practically screamed at him. "The Diamond weapon that 
we faced at Midgar was bad enough; then there was the Ultima weapon too. I do 
NOT, repeat NOT, want to face any of those weapons again. End of story," she 
said, folding her arms for emphasis. 
  "Aw, you just sore 'cos you died," Barret sniffed. "Anyways," he said, 
pointing the gatling gun grafted on his arm to Cloud, "the spikey-headed-ass 
over here saved yours." Cloud had used his superior magic powers to revive and 
restore Yuffie's broken body after the Ultima weapon had made an example out of 
her for her antagonistic remarks.
  "How about this then," Tifa said, her gentle voice slicing through the air 
like a hot knife through butter. "If it's a fight you want, then why don't we go 
to the Gold Saucer? There's that stupid battle square there. It's holographic, 
so you can hurt yourselves."
  "To the Gold saucer then!" Barret shouted, waving the gun arm around, sending 
the others ducking for cover.

END OF CHAPTER 1