It was one of the rare, peaceful afternoons of Vincent Valentine's life. Today, no-one in particular needed saving, there were no Weapons raging about, and no crazy scientist wanted to run experiments on unborn babies - not that he knew of, at least. He was walking along the streets of Edge, content with the fact the citizens no longer stared at him when he visited Seventh Heaven. At first, he had drawn in a lot of attention with his red cape and metal claw. By now, he was a common sight in Edge. That made him feel a bit more at ease.

Edge was a nice place to visit. It was a seemingly poor place, built from the remains of Midgar to be the home of the people who survived Meteor and the uproar it caused on the Planet. None of the people really had much money despite WRO's attempts, but they were still happy enough. They were building their lives from scratch, so they were too busy to be depressed. Children were playing about the streets. Not many of them were likely to remember the disaster that had struch the Planet because of Sephiroth - something Vincent could have stopped ages ago. The guilt was still deep in him, but seeing the children who would grow up never really remembering what had happened really eased his mind.

He turned to the street Seventh Heaven was on. When he approached the door, it shot open and a young woman - no, she would still classify as a girl - stumbled out. She noticed Vincent.

"Vince!" she whispered. "This is horrible! You have to flee!"

"What is it this time, Yuffie?" Vincent asked, sighing. Yuffie annoyed him to no extent, but then again, it would be kind of boring without her around. He was pretty sure this was one of her usual practical jokes. She seemed to like annoying him. Maybe because he was the only one of the group who never really got openly mad at her.

This time, though, Yuffie had a genuinely concerned look in her eyes. "It's one of them again, Vince!" she whispered as silently as she possibly could. "And I think she's after you!"

"One of... them?" Vincent was starting to get anxious, because Yuffie seemed so concerned. She was a bad actor, so she could never pull off her practical jokes without people noticing she was on to something. Vincent pondered who could be after him. The Tsviets? One of Hojo's crazy scientist friends? A completely new organization? And this day had started off so well.

"One of them!" Yuffie whispered a lot louder and slower. She shook her head and motioned Vincent to come closer and look for himself. "You can peek from the door, but be really, really careful."

Vincent kept his calm and stepped forward, next to Yuffie, so that he could see what was going on. Yuffie showed her hand in front of him to stop him from being seen - as if her tiny hand could stop him from advancing to the door. He resisted the urge to say something to her and peeked in.

Yuffie could feel how Vincent flinched, but she didn't blame him. She looked at his face: it had gone ashen and his eyes had widened from the shock. Yuffie imagined how he went through some of his most horrible experiences, ones that haunted his nightmares even more frequently than Lucrecia and Sephiroth. "No... Not again..." he whispered. It was barely audible. He stared at what was inside.

It was a young girl - around 16 years old, maybe - and a very beautiful one at that. She had long, black, silky hair that she had tied back with a crimson ribbon. She also had a crimson cape over her black clothes, and her boots were amazingly similar to those Vincent always weared: brown boots with sharp metal tips that matched his claw. Her eyes appeared to match her cape, but Vincent couldn't tell from afar. She had a tough-looking scar on her face and a pistol stapped to her thigh to further promote her badass image. She clearly wasn't a Tsviet or a scientist, nor had she anything to do with Shinra. She had nothing to do with anything, yet she would undoubtedly claim to know everyone and have an important part in the history of the Planet. She was definitely one of them.

She was a mary sue.

Every time one of them appeared, they turned out to be delusional and rather lacking intelligence-vice. They always seemed to simply adore good-looking males and completely ignore the excistence of the ones that weren't blessed with as much beauty. Sometimes they inexplicably hated the females, sometimes not. You never really knew what to expect from a sue, except that she would undoubtedly and unavoidably drug the whole group and force them to act the way she wanted them to, no matter how unusual it was for them. Vincent had been forced to do some really outrageous things, ones that he still saw nightmares about. He did not care to have more nightmares, so he slowly withdrew from the door, trying not to be seen. The sue was definitely after him. That much he could tell from her clothing.

Before he could get far enough to start running, she noticed him. "Vincent!" she exclamed, showing the most happy - and idiotic - smile.

"Oh, crap," Yuffie mumbled. "Luckily, I expected this much." She took her cape - the one with the hood that hid her face when she was wearing the cape - and threw it on Vincent. It did not work as she had hoped, as it hid neither Vincent's face nor his body. "Uh, it's a little small, I realize." She shrugged.

Vincent gave her a look that spoke for him.

"Oh, come on! I didn't have much time to come up with an escape plan!" Yuffie defended herself. "Stop standing there and run! Are you insane?!"

Vincent turned around to run.

"Don't you remember me? I'm Rosarella, your childhood friend!" The voice had come way too close. Vincent made a giant leap, landed on the rooftops of Edge and ran like the wind. He could still hear the sue talking.

"Ew, get away from me, Yuffie, or I'll kick your ass. Vincent is mine, don't even imagine I'm going to let you have him! You annoying brat!"

"Excuse me?" Yuffie asked in disbelief. This was something completely new and it forced Vincent to stop and think. Could he really flee and leave his friends to deal with the sue? He had so many things he regretted not doing that all his dreams were nightmares. He really did not care to have nightmares of his friends being tortured by a sue. Especially since this one didn't seem to be one of those who were friends with everybody. Maybe Yuffie was the only one she hated, maybe Vincent was the only she didn't hate. In any case, he couldn't just flee and leave them alone. He just had to be extra careful not to ingest the sue's drugs this time. He pulled Yuffie's cape over his head, clutched it and sighed. He sure had changed after the day Cloud and his friends had woken him up from his long slumber. They were his friends, now, too. He turned around and headed back.

"...Besides, I'm way older than you!" Yuffie yelled at the sue. "Technically, they shouldn't even let you enter this bar because you're underage."

"But I've got Tifa-sans permission to," Rosarella answered smugly.

Tifa-san? Yuffie's jaw dropped. All kinds of thoughts circulated around in her head, and all of them had something to do with either fleeing or making the sue mute. Or possibly taking her shuriken out. Too bad she had left it inside. She looked over her shoulder to see if Vincent had gotten away. She almost had a heart attack when she saw him standing behind her.

"You only got this far?!" She exclamed. "I'd be out of Edge by now!"

Vincent ignored her. "Hello, um..."

"Rosarella! I'm Rosie, don't you remember?" the sue was overjoyed. "You're still the same old Vampire Eyes, Vince!"

Bot Vincent and Yuffie flinched. First of all, only Yuffie really called him Vince. Second of all, "Vampire Eyes"? They were dumbstruck. Vincent started to regret coming back.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Vince-chan. I forgot you don't like being called Vampire Eyes!" She chuckled, clearly expecting Yuffie and Vincent to laugh, too. An ice-cold silence followed. Vincent was rendered speachless and Yuffie was occupied on fighting the urge to kill Rosarella, or Rosie, or whatever she was supposed to be called.

"Why don't we go inside?" Rosarella suggested, completely oblivious of awkwardness surrounding her. Vincent simply nodded and they proceeded to enter Seventh Heaven.

Rosarella was greeted by the rest of the group with disappointed frowns, but she didn't mind. She didn't mind that Marlene quietly left the room as soon as she stepped in and Barret withdrew to the furthest corner with Cid and Shera. She didn't mind that Tifa suddenly became almost ridiculously busy with cleaning the tables and that Cloud got awfully pale.

"Hello again," she yelled to Cloud with an unnecessarily loud voice. "Missed me, Chocobo Head? Were you jealous?"

Cloud winced at the nickname. It's not for you to use, he thought to himself. Heck, where had she even heard that name? She sure wasn't smart enough to make things up herself. She smiled graciously at Cloud, waiting for him to answer. He forced himself to smile so that she would leave him alone. "Believe me, not it the slightest bit."

"Aww! Come on!" the sue yelled, still being awfully loud. He came to Cloud and teasingly hit him in the arm. "I know you missed me! We used to be so good friends... We were inseparable back in Nibelheim, don't you think?"

"I thought she said she was Vincent's childhood friend," Cid mumbled to Barret in the corner. "What's up with that? Is she just making it up as she goes?"

"Yo, drink up and leave the thinkin'. It's not gonna do you any good anyway," he answered, slowly shaking his head. "I also doubt Vincent ever was a kid."

Roserella did not care. In her delusional world, Cid and Barret apparently didn't exist. She had not paid any attention to them for the whole time she had been around. For that, Cid and Barret - not to mention Shera - were happy. Tifa had also been ignored for the most part, but poor Cloud was almost ready to scream, run around and suffer a mental breakdown. The sue kept hugging him and calling him with weird nicknames, so he had decided to escape to Aeris's church whenever he got the change. He was eyeing the window behind the counter with grat anxiety.

"But I'm sorry! My fiancée is here now, so I can't give you so much attention anymore," Roserella sighed and smiled at Cloud apologizingly.

"Your fiancée? Uh, I see," he smiled at her, his eye twitching.

"Yeah. When we were kids, me and Vincent got engaged."

"WHAT?!" Yuffie yelled. It was exactly what everyone else had intended to do, but now that Yuffie had taken care of it, they just all turned to look at the sue. How was she going to explain this?

"Yeah, I think our parents had something to do with it, but we both agreed. Right, Vince-chaaan?" She smiled from ear to ear.

"I have no recollection of this," Vincent said with the coldest possible tone.

"Aww, really? Maybe it's because of the experiments Hojo ran on you? Or because you slept for so long?" Roserella was so happy and vivid her clothes really didn't suit her. She looked like a cheap copy of Vincent, but she didn't act anything like it. This lead the group to imagine how she'd turn them all into smiling idiots. They all shivered.

"Excuse me," Yuffie said and leaned forward, towards the sue. "How is it possible for you to know all this? Also, where were you for the last fourty years? How come you're so young?"

"Oh..." A dark expression crossed Roserella's pretty face and her hair conveniently fell to cover half of her face. The effect would have been really dramatical had there been some background music - and had someone been interested in what she had to say. All she did was make them feel sick and annoyed. She was not the first sue to bother them. They could predict her life story pretty well.

She told it anyway. "I lived in the same town as Vince-chan when I was small... We were really great friends! If only we had had more time together, I'm sure we would have become lovers..." Her voice trembled and her eyes filled with tears. "But then my father died and I had to move away! I was young when I was chosen as a Turk, and that's how I met Lucrecia... But I knew Vince-chan loved her, so I decided not to tell him I was there. Then Hojo found me and noticed how special I was, so he experimented on me." She started sobbing and Yuffie couldn't help but to roll her eyes. "My time froze and I can't age anymore. All I know I heard from Lucrecia, as she was my best friend before she died. We were inseparable..."

"Uh, okay. So, what did Hojo do to you?" Tifa asked, immediately regretting she did so.

This time, the sue's eyes lit up with excitement. "Want to see what he did to me? It's called Project Moon Blood Crystal, or Project MBC. I'll show you my true form!" She undid the straps on her cape and let it fall down on the floor, revealing her clothing underneath. She had well-formed breasts and perfect curves. They always did, didn't they?

She threw her hair back and her eyes turned violet. Glowing a bright light, she turned into a black cat with silver angel wings. "I'm Sephiroth's sister!" She exclamed happily. "Jenova is my mother, too!"

Cloud stumbled out of the room, unable to take any more of her and her vomit-inducing stories.

"Oh, no! Cloud! I'm not evil like Sephy-chan, don't go!" She ran after him and the rest of the gang was left in the bar alone.

"Why are we bein' so friendly?" Barret asked. "This way they ain't gonna stop botherin' us, ya know!"

"I don't know," Tifa sighed. "Maybe they have some sort of mind control materia or something. I want to throw her out for disturbing Cloud, but I can't bring myself to actually say anything."

"Mind control materia?" Interest and greed flashed in Yuffie's eyes. "You really think so, Tifa? Is that kind of thing possible?" She pointed the last question to Vincent by turning to him.

"Don't ask me," he simply answered, clearly disturbed by the possibilty. "I've always thought they drug us somehow... Seeing as how they always appear here in Seventh Heaven first."

"I guess that's possible," Yuffie admitted reluctantly. She had suddenly started to see the sunny sides of the sue when she realized she could get her hands on a completely new kind of materia. "But Tifa would notice if someone did something funny to her drinks... Right?"

"I don't know," Tifa said shaking her head. "I can't keep an eye on everything."

"I still think mind control materia is more plausible," Yuffie decided, nodding sturdily. She turned to Vincent again to ask something. She never got the chance to say anything, though, as Roserella barged in and threw her aside with her huge cat paws. Even with her excellent ninja skills, Yuffie couldn't defend herself from an attack as sudden as that. She flew a few meters, bringing down a table and a few chairs as she went.

"Yuffie!" Tifa yelled. She was dubfounded by the sudden turn of events - and the destruction of her bar. What was the sue up to now?

"I saw that," Roserella hissed at Yuffie as she stood up slowly from the pile of wood that had been furniture just a moment ago, "I saw what you did there. Don't play dumb on me!"

"What?" Yuffie asked. "Does anyone know what happened?" She was completely astonished.

"I saw what you were trying to do to poor Vince-chan!" Roserella growled at her. She then turned to Vincent. "Are you okay, Vince-chan?"

"What was she trying to do to me?" Vincent looked at Yuffie. She might have tried to pull off some prank again, but he didn't think she still deserved to be thrown trough tables and chairs. Luckily, she didn't seem to be injured.

"She was trying to kill you! That crazy bitch has been after your life for quite some time now! I know because of my psychic skills!" Roserella told Vincent, her crimson cat eyes filled with tears. "I'm trying to save you, Vince-chan... Vinnie... Because I..."

"KILL HIM?!" Yuffie bellowed. "Excuse me, but why would I KILL HIM?!"

"I don't know! Because you're a crazy bitch and I hate you?" Roserella sneered at her. "I am good, so if I hate you, you must be bad. You're like Sephiroth! You want to kill people for no reason!"

"Actually, Sephiroth did have a vague reason," Tifa tried to interrupt her, but she was bluntly ignored.

"This one is even more delusional than the others," Yuffie sighed as she held her head. "I'm getting a huge headache out of this. Vince, can you tell her I'm not after your life? Maybe she'll listen to you."

"Actually, she's right," Vincent told Roserella. "She might be annoying and loud and steal her friend's materia all the time, but I'm sure she isn't after anyone's life."

"See, that's what she pretends," Roserella explained patiently, like all her listeners were idiots. "But I know her real self, because on top of being ridiculously beautiful and strong, I am also a psychic. She is just an ugly, stupid, hyperactive spy-chic!" She turned to Vincent and transformed back to a human. Her eyes glittered with tears as she approached him. "I'm just so afraid... Vinnie... Vince-chan... Because I..." She sniffed and pressed her hands against his chest. "I love you, Vinnie," she whispered.

"Oh, dear! Who could've guessed?" Yuffie shouted, rolling her eyes.

"I... too..." Vincent stuttered. His eyes were desperate as he looked at the sue in disgust.

Cid and Barret jumped up and their chairs fell down. Tifa dropped the glass she had been cleaning and started to put on her leather gloves. Yuffie's vision scanned the room for her shuriken, but it was nowhere to be seen. She then prepared to fight the sue with her fists. She was one of the delusional, mind-controlling sues they sometimes had to deal with. She seemed to be a particularly dangerous one, seeing as she claimed Yuffie to be a criminal and had already taken hold of Vincent's mind.

"I.... love..." Vincent slowly repeated the words echoing in his head. Something forced him to say it, even though he tried to stop it. It reminded him of being posessed by Chaos or Galian Beast or one of his other monster forms. He had no control of himself.

Neither did his friends. They tried to barge forward and attack the sue, but the weird presence in their heads was pinning their feet down and forcing them to stay still and smile. Yes, it even forced their lips to bend into an unnatural smile. They were so frustrated... It was always like this with the sues. The sues never cared about anything else but making the story turn out as they wanted it to turn out. They forced normal people act they way they wanted, completely ignoring the people's personalities and wishes. Yuffie felt like an actor.

"Can... I... bake cookies... for you..." The forced words flowed out of Vincents with an increasing speed.

Nobody could stop the sue. They were forced to follow another happy story of her having kids with Vincent or marrying him or something along those lines. There was, of course, the downside that Yuffie might actually die this time. She growled. Then, suddenly, from growling and being posessed by a sue, she got a brilliant idea.

"Vincent," she yelled, albeit slowly, as the sue was trying to keep her quiet. "Chaos!"

The sweet realization sweeped over Vincent as he released his consciousness and let Chaos take him over. He would have never thought he'd willingly let one of his monster forms take him over - moreover, he was happy to do so. For once, Chaos could do whatever it wanted to do, Vincent wouldn't interfere nor regret it.

Roserella noticed that Vincent started to change shape. "Oh, no! Chaos! It's all Yuffies, fault... But I'll save you with the power of pure love!" She hugged Vincent's chest as hard as she could.

Not that Chaos cared. It hugged her right back, causing her spine to snap. She was dead before she even realized it, and thus everyone regained control of their bodies.

Everyone's first free action was a relieved sigh.

"YAY! We did it! We beat the unbeatable!" Yuffie rejoiced, jumping around despite the bruises she had in her legs.

"Why didn't we think of that before?" Tifa asked.

"Finally something I won't have to regret nor have nightmares over," Vincent muttered to himself right before Yuffie jumped to hug him. Normally he would've dodged, but this time... "This time you deserve it," he told her.

"Huh?" was Yuffie's answer.

He shook his head. "Nothing." He was just happy he didn't have to bake cookies like the sue had tried to force him to do.