Heart of Glass

10

"How?! How does this keep happening? It's not fair! I swear you're cheating somehow; you must be!" Yuffie's exclaiming and apparent tantrum had some looking her way, she was even stomping an unhappy foot every so often while pointing a finger firmly in Nelly's direction. The poor honey-eyed female just awkwardly smiled, scratched the back of her neck and dismissed Yuffie's shouting with her other hand. It didn't calm the ninja girl down, if anything it made her worse.

Nelly all but blanched when Yuffie stomped around her control unit and came standing toe to toe with Nelly. She just blinked wide and confused eyes as Yuffie looked her over, "Honestly, I'm not cheating...I'm just naturally good at this game, I guess?"

"But I honed my skills on this by beating so many people before you appeared!" Yuffie all but whined while hanging her head, even her shoulders slackened and she huffed out a sigh. "So many people...do you know how many parents glared at me, Nelly? So, many!" She perked up and shuddered at that, Yuffie was naturally quite competitive, it was just a strong characteristic of hers, but beating children on this game bought little pleasure when the parents glared her way. Yuffie wasn't completely ignorant, but also, she wasn't going to throw a game just to appease someone else's child, someone she wasn't going to meet again. It may have seemed harsh, mean, but Yuffie was determined to get good at this game solely to beat Nelly.

Nelly's eyes widened and she looked around concernedly, she was expecting to see glaring children and parents alike lurking somewhere still in the room. There wasn't any, which made Nelly let out a relieved sigh. She wasn't happy her friend got the backlash of angry parents, but then again, Nelly knew how Yuffie could be...the younger girl no doubt celebrated quite loudly over her victory, because she always did when fighting fiends, so a game would no doubt be no different.

Seeing as how her exuberant friend had quietened down, Nelly reached over and patted her on the shoulder. With a warm smile, Nelly watched Yuffie's large brown eyes blink and look at her curiously. "Listen, I'm awful at Fort Condor, whereas you are amazing at it! You've beaten me on that how many times? Yuffie, as much as it would be great to be fantastic at everything, it sometimes doesn't work like that." Nelly said with a small sigh, there was only a few years between them, but Nelly could remember being younger and full of gusto that she could tackle anything and succeed. Sure, right now they were on about a video game, but Yuffie excelled in other things which Nelly was awful at; Fort Condor was one thing, but Yuffie's ninja abilities which had been honed into her from a young age were something which Nelly was always amazed by, but also had zero chance of ever competing with.

Putting a finger to her chin, Yuffie seemed to think over what she said before rolling the same hand in the air. She wasn't dismissing what Nelly had said, but she still didn't look totally bought on it. She grinned at Nelly admitting Yuffie had her beat at Fort Condor, but the latter part of Nelly's words just had Yuffie looking unsure. Nelly just smiled in turn, she didn't totally know Yuffie's past, what really bought her to their group, she never fully explained, but there was something in her eyes which said to Nelly that she may have not wanted to agree, but she accepted it.

There were always going to be things which weren't naturally easy, and there would always be someone better at something else than herself, that's just how it went. Nelly couldn't do ninja abilities, Yuffie had her on that one, but Yuffie also, as skilled as she was, was perhaps unable to fight with Nelly's twin swords, though given time Nelly knew she'd succeed with that. Their weaponry wasn't that dissimilar in a way.

"Maybe you could coach me?" Yuffie asked with a wry grin, she tilted her head looking excited by that prospect whereas Nelly just despaired. She somehow got the feeling that if she gave Yuffie more pointers to get better at this game, she'd instantly hound her for more rematches but also the thought of more upset children came to Nelly's mind.