Aetiyu

[Tifa Lockhart]

Ynyr tottered forward to stand beside his sister, grinning up at his grandmother.
"And milk too!" He said, clapping happily, "Please." He added quickly after Zack gave him a gentle nudge.

[The Painted Lady]

"I think that can be arranged," Elmyra smiled, kissing Ynyr's forehead too.
"Why don't you go sit down with Mum and Dad and I'll bring your milk and cookies to you, okay?" she said, straightening.

[Tifa Lockhart]

"OK! Thankyou Grammy!" Ynyr said, turning around and rushing back to his dad, making grabby hands at his dad.
"Alright, up ya come." Zack said, putting down his mug and helping the boy up onto his knee. "Happy?"
"Yes daddy." Ynyr replied with a smile.

[The Painted Lady]

Aerith smiled, doing them same for Ashlynn, who simply tugged patiently at the hem of her dress.
"Isn't your grandmother good to you, hm?"

Ashlynn nodded as she made herself comfortable, resting in against Aerith's body.

"Be careful of the hot drink there, won't you?" Aerith warned her daughter gently.

[Tifa Lockhart]

"Yuppy yup." Ynyr said happily as he bounced on Zack's knee.
"Careful." The SOLDIER warned softly, "Wouldn't want you to fall off now would we?" He laughed as Ynyr pulled a face at him. 'What? We wouldn't!" He joked
"Daddy wouldn't drop me!" Ynyr said in a tone that suggested he thought Zack was being silly. "Daddy is fast and strong, never drop nobody!"
"Anybody." Zack corrected softly, "And no... i don't suppose i would... often."

[The Painted Lady]

Aerith smiled, finding it amusing that their children thought Zack was invincible. With one arm securing Ashlynn - who was a lot calmer - she reached over to squeeze Zack's hand gently, before Elmyra arrived with a glass of milk and a plate of cookies for each.

"Now, don't eat them too quickly," Elmyra warned as Ashlynn instantly reached for hers.
"You don't want to get sick..."
She took her seat, taking a sip of her drink before she looked to Aerith and Zack.
"... I suppose you don't want to talk about what you've been through with the children present."

Aerith paused before she shook her head.
"No... no, they have a right to know too."
She looked to Zack.
"We haven't discussed it yet."

[Tifa Lockhart]

Zack sighed slightly, readjusting Ynyr on his lap so that he could reach the cookies easier.
"Well... i guess we could start by telling you about how Aerith and I were attacked by strange crystal-mimics of ourselves. We had no idea what they were, and though they weren't too hard to fight off it was a worry..."

[The Painted Lady]

"I remember Mummy having to take that pink lady away..." Ashlynn mumbled quietly.
"She was trying to hurt you..."

Aerith sighed softly, bowing her head to kiss the top of her daughter's gently.
"That's right honey. Another one tried to hurt Daddy and then that..." she struggled to describe it so a three-year old would understand, "big blue screen appeared outside our house and you met Uncle Squall and Aunty Rinoa, remember?"

[Tifa Lockhart]

Ynyr nodded ferverently, "I remembers." He said with a slight giggle, "They was wierd. Then Uncle Spike and Aunty Tifa came."

"Yes." Zack said, confirming the boy's memory, "And they'd been attacked by copies of themselves as well. Apparently it was these strange people that had been hurting Squall and his friends as well." He sighed slightly and rubbed his head, "Squall told us that it was the doing of someone called "Chaos" and that a goddess named "Cosmos" needed our help to stop these copies from destroying all the worlds."

[The Painted Lady]

"He also told us that his world had already been destroyed by Chaos, and that we could face the same fate if we didn't act fast," Aerith said quietly, hugging her daughter gently.
"It was all so quick... we barely had time to set up for Yuffie and Kunsel to look after the twins and say goodbye... I'm sorry we didn't contact you Mom..."

Elmyra shook her head, but remained silent so the story could continue.

"After we left, we were taken away to Spira... You remember Mom? Where our intergalactic help came from when the Lifestream was poisoned?"
Aerith paused, swallowing.
"Anyway, as it turns out, Yuna and Tidus were being summoned too. They had to leave their two little ones behind too. They're both around the same age as the twins."

[Tifa Lockhart]

"Really!?" Ynyr exclaimed, sounding excited, "I wanna meet them!"
"Maybe one day." Zack said, petting his son gently on the head.
"After we met them we went to meet Cosmos... she told us we had to defeat the warriors of Chaos in order to obtain our crystals... which were to be our way home." He shook his head, remembering how hostile he'd been the Cosmos at first for taking him away from his kids and endangering their future.
"From there things got messy very quickly... old enemies, new ones... it was horrible." He sighed and massaged his eyes.

[The Painted Lady]

Aerith glanced to Zack, biting her lip.
"We were all assigned particular warriors each. Not to fight exclusively of course; if you had a chance to eliminate someone, you just did it."
She had a horrible flash of having to repair broken bodies, convincing people that they couldn't give up just yet...
"But we were each put in charge of retrieving a crystal from each. Otherwise we couldn't return home."

Elmyra frowned a little.
"So... who did you have to fight exactly?"

[Tifa Lockhart]

Zack sighed again and shook his head before looking up at Elmyra, he was reliving horrible memories too, including several occasions where he thought he wouldn't be going home at all.
"Well, we were usually pit against old rivals, people Cosmos felt we would know how to fight. I ended up fighting Genesis... an old SOLDIER friend of mine from before Meteor Fall..." He glanced at Aerith and sought her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze.

[The Painted Lady]

Aerith squeezed Zack's hand tightly.
"And I had JENOVA," she said quietly, remembering the grotesque forms the creature would take on and the horrific poison it would inflict on her.
"Which meant that Sephiroth and a remnant of his could reform again too..."

[Tifa Lockhart]

"Whom Tifa and Cloud fought..." Zack said with a sigh, remembering how badly Cloud had taken Sephiroth's reappearance. "It wasn't easy... but we won in the end."