A/N: My giftfic for the 2018 FF7 Fanworks Exchange, for greenjudy's prompt "A day in the life of the AVALANCHE crew."

Midgar hadn't been a great place. Oh, maybe once upon a time, when it was all shiny and new and running on dreams, but by the time Aerith had come along it was rust and rubbish and top heavy with the bloat of greed. Maybe she was biased, living in the Slums and only seeing bits and pieces of the Plate when she went to sell her flowers. But she didn't think so. There was something rotten and oily and ugly about it. She'd always wanted to leave, even though she knew the Turks would never allow it.

She'd stopped caring what the Turks thought when Tseng brought her in and turned her over to Hojo. He hadn't had a choice, of course, there was a wire-taught tension in him that said something bigger was on the line, that he'd been forced to make a choice and she had lost. She'd seen it coming for a long time, ever since Veld had been killed. Turks took care of their own, and she'd never let them draw her into the fold.

But it didn't matter now.

She paused, of course, when they finally escaped their pursuers and made it over the walls that had penned her in. She looked back. Thought of her mother and Marlene and over twenty years living in Midgar's shadows.

And then she looked forward. Cloud and Barret were talking about who should take the lead and how they should travel and all she could do was stare at the seemingly-endless stretch of dry, cracked earth. Dead, like Midgar had been, except for her bed of lillies. She wondered if she could make something grow here. Not that there was time, they had to keep moving, but she wondered…

"We're going to Kalm next," Tifa said.

Aerith nodded. She knew a little about Kalm, about how it had been bombed and built back up. Now she'd get to see it for herself. "Okay."

It was a long way to Kalm on foot. Tifa wasn't sure how many miles it was, only that it felt like it was lasting forever. Cloud probably could have taken off at a run and gotten there already, but he was keeping to their pace and hadn't complained about it. While there was a sense of urgency at first in getting away from Midgar and ShinRa's greedy clutches, as it grew increasingly distant, they could finally catch their breath.

It still loomed on the horizon, no trees to block the view and none of the craggy rocks managing to reach enough height to block it, but it was miles away now and sitting there, trying to get a fire started, she found she didn't really care.

"You know, I have a fire materia -" Cloud started, just a hint of amusement in his tone, and she glowered at him. He shut up.

After a couple moments she found her flint and got a spark, making a triumphant sound and resisting the childish urge to stick her tongue out at him. He patted her shoulder and headed off, presumably to check their supplies. He'd done a lot of that, which was ridiculous since he had absolutely no sense of that. She and Aerith were managing it just fine.

Aerith was fiercely practical when it came to making things last, something Tifa appreciated now more than ever. They had to make their supplies last until they reached Kalm, and even then there was going to be a tighter budget unless they could sell something. Cloud seemed to think they could sell monster parts, so they'd harvested parts of the Kalm Fangs that they came across. Teeth, bone and hides, while they ate off the meat and froze the rest. She hadn't known you could eat them, because they looked like they were some distant cousin to the Nibel wolves but Aerith had vouched for it. Apparently it was something they used in the Slums, even if they often sold it as something else. It was a gamy meat, lean with a tendency to get tough if you cooked it the slightest bit too long, but it was protein and they weren't in a position to be choosy. They hadn't planned to have to flee Midgar right then, and most of what they had were battle supplies.

"We're really going to have to stock up in Kalm." Aerith came over to sit beside her, brushing her hair back. "I think we're getting close."

"Yeah?" Tifa glanced at her. They hadn't gotten opportunity to talk much, but this sort of mad adventure had a way of creating a bond. "Did you see something?"

"Just a feeling," Aerith said, shrugging it off. "Do you want me to go get some of the meat?"

"Yes, please." She sighed, getting at the cheap metal pan they'd fashioned out of part of one of the patrol machines that ShinRa had put in place. It was crude, but it did the job and she couldn't complain about that. Thankfully, both Aerith and Cloud had had decent knives on hand; hers was a switchblade, but his was longer, a dagger that was just shy of a short sword - something he could use when there wasn't enough space to pull his massive Buster Sword. Between the two, they could cut the meat into manageable chunks. They desperately needed proper camping supplies, but that would have to wait until they reached Kalm.

Aerith came back with several chunks of meat that had been thawing the past couple hours. "Should be enough, don't you think?"

"Yeah, should be fine." Cloud's enhanced appetite aside, no one else appeared too keen to eat much of it. Well, Red, but Red was a breed of his own. Literally. "Pop it in the pan and we'll get cooking."

Someone had said 'it was the little pleasures that made life worth living.' For Aerith, that had always been true.

She'd never been one to sleep late, but she made a special effort to be up early in time to watch the sunrise. She'd never seen anything like it, the light mostly blocked by the Plate and the walls. The first morning she'd happened to be up, having trouble sleeping with all the worries on her mind, she'd just come out of the tent she and Tifa shared and blinked as she saw the first golden rays starting to creep over the horizon. Fascinated, she'd found a place to sit and watch as the sky lightened from murky gray to a flush of rosy pink, clouds streaked with violet and backlit by a brilliant golden orange.

It was beautiful. And surrounded by the vast, barren expanse of Midgar's wastes, it was something she'd needed more than she'd realized.

But it was nothing compared to the moment they'd been walking and she'd felt life. A breath caught in her throat and she scanned the area, wondering if maybe it was another pack of Kalm Fangs. It didn't feel like it, it felt green and earthy, like -

Grass.

Her eyes lit on sudden patchy areas of grass that started to break through the otherwise barren earth, skipping ahead to inspect it. She bent down, running a palm over the small blades, stubbornly growing where nothing else dared.

"You don't really get grass in Midgar, huh?" Barret stopped beside her, mouth hooked up in a crooked smile. "Wait til we get outta Midgar's shadow. You'll see some real grass around Kalm."

And she did. Even before they got there, the rocky ground slowly gave way to a long spread of wild grasses, growing high and tickling her legs as she walked. They were dotted with bursts of wildflowers, seeds blown by the breeze and threading in with the tall grass for bursts of color. If she'd had a way to preserve them, she might have picked some, but as it was she kept it as a cherished memory as they made their way into town.

They finally reached Kalm, and Aerith was struck with how old it looked for a town that had been burnt to the ground not twenty years ago. It looked like it had been standing there for centuries, all weathered brick and aged woods. No one else seemed to notice, and she didn't comment, but as soon as they'd spent some time hashing out their vague plans going forward she went out to explore.

Cloud went to haggle their monster parts, but in the meantime they had enough gil to refresh their supplies, and put in some good stock for some basic needs. Bedrolls, tents, cookware, food - actual, non-monster food that didn't have the chance of making them sick if they ate too much of it - and more emergency supplies for taking care of them after battles. Cures were great, but it was an energy drain with a whole host of potential problems and side effects if you tried it on something serious. Some things needed to be cleaned, and sometimes stitches were the better idea.

Fortunately, they had a variety of little shops that would do what was needed, including a general store that Aerith and Tifa vanished into. While there were fresh goods - many of them tempting - it wasn't what they needed. They needed things that would travel well, and stretch far.

"Canned and dried things?" Tifa said, meeting her eyes as they gravitated that way.

"And a cooler where we can freeze and store things," Aerith said firmly. "And some spices."

"Yes please," Tifa agreed immediately.

Together they went through the aisles, carefully making selections that were cheap, durable, and multipurpose - things that Aerith had been shopping for ever since the first time Elmyra had taken her out. Powdered milk. Several tea tins. Rice. Beans. Canned vegetables. Canned soups. Canned meats. Flour. Sugar. Salt and pepper along with several other little containers of spices. A jug of cooking oil. A wheel of hard cheddar and a pound of butter, because you needed something indulgent, and it would keep in the cooler Barret had found a couple aisles over with a judicious application of Ice. They got great big water jugs and five canteens and moved on to finding the best cutlery and cookware they could get for their budget and on the road. Fortunately, Kalm apparently catered to travelers, because there were actual camping sets.

It was evening by the time they had not only found what they needed, but purchased baggage to carry it all in. But they'd managed it with some gil to spare, and Cloud had been very successful in his haggling, adding to their total funds. Which was good, because they were going to need to head further east, and rent some chocobos.

"You sure this is a good idea?" Barret asked.

"You want to walk through the marsh?" Cloud glanced at him, a brow raised, and he grimaced. "Didn't think so. And that's without getting into the Zolom."

"The what now?"

"Literally a giant, man eating snake. If you can't outrun it, you're lunch," Cloud said, leading the way into the farm. "And other than Red and I, I don't think anyone's gonna outrun it. Maybe not even us, depending on how thick that marsh is. Water's hard enough to run in before you get to mud."

"Still… they got a bird that's gonna carry me?" the bigger man asked. "An' what about Red, huh? He can't ride."

"They had birds to carry SOLDIERs, you'll be fine," Cloud said. "And we'll come up with something for Red. Maybe he'll ride with one of us. Doubling up where we can is a good idea anyway."

"I guess." Barret frowned, watching the girls take off to go see the fenced in 'bos and coo over their bright, fluffy feathers.

Just yellows out in the pen, though Cloud knew Bill's ranch had produced chocobos of all colors, many of them going on to race in Gold Saucer's famous track, or serving some branch of ShinRa's forces. There was a reason someone could say something as generic as 'the chocobo farm' and know instantly what was meant - they were the name in chocobo breeders.

"They're so cute!" Aerith cooed, stroking the crest of one particularly bold chocobo that was leaning across the fence to nuzzle right into her palm.

Another couple came trotting up, pawing at the ground with great big, powerful talons and warking at them, eager for attention. Cloud laughed, coming up to pet one's beak and warking back at it.

The chocobo straightened, looking at him as if he'd just said something astonishing.

And then they danced.

There was no other word for the graceful series of swooping and ducking motions the big birds made, kicking their legs and fluttering their wings at him. The birds were dancing for them, triggered by some nuance he'd never realized he was putting into the word.

"What'd you say, chocobo head?" Barret asked.

"I have no idea." Cloud didn't bother to protest it, blinking wide eyes at them. Something shiny caught his eye, a gleam of red, and he blinked as it hooked between two of one of the chocobo's talons and came flying through the air at him. His hand snapped up reflexively, fingers closing around a small red orb. He could feel the latent power even through his gloves.

Materia?

"What…" He turned his hand, rolling it around his palm. It was still a baby, couldn't be more than first level, but it was undeniably a summon. A chocobo had literally just tossed him a summon. This was his life now. "…we should probably check if Bill dropped this."

"That would be the right thing to do," Red agreed, coming to sniff delicately at the pen before walking around it. "Up ahead?"

"Yeah, that building there." Cloud pointed, glancing at the birds, who had returned to grazing and wandering about as if nothing had happened. Strange.