Quote Originally Posted by masamune1600
(SPOILER)What the Icicle Inn tapes imply, then, is that Professor Gast was killed by Hojo and his men, but Ifalna and Aeris somehow managed to escape.
You were correct on every count but this.

(SPOILER)What they imply is that Aerith and Elmyra escaped from Shin-Ra some seven years after that, but were captured when Gast was killed. Recall that Aerith was only 20 days old according to the tapes at the time of Gast's death, but that it had been fifteen years since Elmyra took Aerith in. Aerith is 22 years old in the game's present. Thus, she was seven at the time of Ifalna's death. She and her mother had spent roughly seven years in captivity.