Wall Market. If you had something to sell,
this is where you sold it. But goods wasn't the only thing they sold
here. The first thing that caught Cloud's eye was a huge mansion
brightly lit with neon lights and surrounded by young men. "Welcome
to Honeybee Inn!" a man shouted at him. "Here even nerds like you
can find their destiny!" Remembering how scantily Tifa was dressed,
he quickly questioned a man standing in front of the entrance of the sleazy
establishment. "Is there some way I can help you?" the man asked
politely. "Heard of a girl called Tifa?" Cloud inquired. "Hey,
you're pretty quick," the man replied. "She's our new girl.
It's our custom to send new girls to Don Corneo's though." Repeating
the name in his head, Cloud left without a word to look for this Don Corneo.
On his way, he saw a shack that looked like it might have something useful
inside. He saw a familiar computer terminal and fiddled around with
it; instantly, he jumped from surprise when he heard loud shooting coming
from above him. Looking up, he saw a machine gun, probably part of
an advanced, and illegal, security system. "Broken," he concluded.
Cloud kept going with no further distractions until
he reached a building even larger than the Honeybee Inn. "This must
be it," he thought. Immediately, a man standing at the entrance exclaimed,
"Whoa, she's a cute one!" Then, as if just noticing Cloud, he remarked,
"Look, the Don's not into men, so you'd better scram."
"Don't worry, Cloud," Aeris assured. "I'll
go in alone."
"No way! You never know what you might meet
in there!"
"What, you want to come with me?"
"Well, that'll be kinda hard for me, being a man.
But I can't just bust in there. Oh man..." Cloud stood there agonizing
over the dilemma when Aeris suddenly started giggling. That was the
last thing he expected her to do at a time like this.
"What are you laughing about?" he asked impatiently.
"I just thought of something," she said, trying
to suppress her laughter. "Why don't you dress up as a woman?"
"What?!" exclaimed Cloud, shocked at the sheer ridiculousness
of the thought.
"Oh, come on, Cloud, it's the only way. You
want to know about Tifa, don't you?"
"Yeah, but..." Cloud sighed in defeat, unable to
come up with any other solutions. He remembered passing a clothes
shop on his way to the mansion and reluctantly made his way back to the
stores. Upon finding and entering the clothes shop, Aeris politely
walked up to the counter and gave the young lady behind it her request.
"I'd like a dress, please."
"A dress?" the woman replied, hesitating.
"I'm sorry, but my father makes all the dresses and he's been in a slump
lately."
"What do you mean?" Aeris asked, concerned about
the growing complexity of the situation.
"Oh, he's just lost all motivation and spends all
day drinking," the woman sighed.
"Hmmm, maybe we can help him," suggested Aeris,
seeing no other choice. "Where could we find him?"
"Oh, you would really help him?" the woman said
excitedly. "You could probably find him at the bar. You don't
how much this means to me!"
"Well, if he doesn't come back, I don't get a dress,
right?" Aeris stated, getting to the point. "I'm going to do whatever
I can." Now with a new problem on their hands, Cloud and Aeris left
the clothes shop to plan their next move.
"The sushi bar..." Cloud thought. "Yeah, I
remember where that was. Come on, Aeris, follow me," he said aloud.
After a few minutes of searching, he finally recognized the bar and entered
the building. Repulsed by the strong smell of smoke and rotting meat,
Cloud could hardly suppress his reflexes and hurried to the bathroom, only
to find it occupied by another sick customer. Frustrated, he looked
around and saw a man trying to suppress reflexes of his own. "Would
you please get her out of there? I've been waiting forever!" he moaned.
"You're not alone," Cloud replied under his breath. Suddenly, he
remembered why he came here in the first place and looked around.
He saw an obviously depressed man just finishing what looked like his fourth
bottle of liquor. "Are you the father of the lady at the clothes
shop?" Aeris inquired tentatively.
"Clothes? Yeah, I make clothes. But
I ain't your father," the man replied, half-drunk.
"I didn't say that..." Aeris corrected gently, being
careful not to provoke the intoxicated man.
"Look, I need a dress," Cloud interrupted impatiently.
"Wha...?!" slurred the confused clothesmaker.
"Cloud!" Aeris reproved nervously, "Just let me
handle this and go get yourself a drink okay?"
Cloud grudgingly agreed not to interrupt but stayed
close by.
"Well," Aeris continued with the man, "my friend
here always said that he'd like to dress up as a cute girl just once.
So will you make him a dress?"
"What?! A big guy like him?"
"Well, will you make it?"
"Hmmm, this could be interesting. I've never
done anything like this before."
"Well, what about it?"
"Sure. What are you looking for?"
Aeris paused for a moment to recall the most arousing
material she could think of. "Something that...shimmers...and...feels
soft," she described.
"Okay, just let me get the picture in my head...hmmm,
yeah, that's good."
Cloud and Aeris gave each other an invisible high-five.
