I uh…guess I should mention. 'I' am more or less dated back to December of 2009. I started this story back in December of 2009, so, that's where we'll date it. No Japan, no nothing. Still at home. Quite a lot has happened, to me and around me, since then.

There's another thing. I'm older than most self-inserts you'll find, and older than most of the people who might read this. And if I were to include the last 11 months, I would be different. Makes me wonder what 'I' in this story am like compared to myself, or where I'll take 'myself.' Okay, let's get going.

Disclaimer: Yeah, no, still haven't even got to Tokyo. Nothing to report.

At first Liz had thought it was all a hallucination, and she clung to that hope with fanatic desperation, but it became ever more an impossibility to ignore her surroundings. Hallucination or not, things hurt: her stomach, when she didn't eat, her feet, when she stubbed her toe, her skin, when it itched badly or she got hit with something. She was terribly allergic to some invisible agent that didn't smell like anything, used in Shinra's artillery, and it gave her a rash that raged for about four hours after exposure. It took a while before the symptoms manifested themselves.

Liz was breaking out into livid red hives and swelling in funny places by the time they reached the Pagoda of the Five Gods. Swelling up as badly as she did—and it was bad—was life threatening if it affected her throat or tongue, but there wasn't anything she could have done. She had never had reliable access to safe antihistamines here. There was no availability of chemical antihistamines to speak of; the only things that were available were holistic and had to be cheap and plentiful (or at least filchable) in a wartime economy in the poorer districts. None of them were.

This meant that for the most part she had to simply wait it out. There had been a particular scare once, when it seemed like her throat had started to close up, but either it never had in the first place or it faded before it reached a deadly degree, because soon after the feeling faded, and she lived.

She hated having allergic reactions. Maybe it was because she wasn't from this world, and her immune system had no idea what to do with alien germs, and because Liz barely had allergies back home (although what she had were similarly severe, they were obscure and only seemed to exist on paper), so it so hit her all the harder when she was affected. Her only comfort was that she hadn't caused any epidemics, herself, as far as she knew, and that wasn't even beneficial to herself.

Liz, who had not started out the trek in a piss poor mood at all, was broiling as they entered the area. It was hectic and loud under the bright white flood lights, but she ignored everything, and followed Iskra, the brother of the man who had come and spoke to her by the fire. That man had been called away at the last second, no one else could be found, and so it was only four of them that went in the end.

It was the first time in an hour they had been under any light to speak of, and she felt surly and unappreciative when the man walking next to her stopped dead in his tracks, and asked in a stunned voice if she was alright.

"I'm alive."

Liz felt it was an honest answer, despite its impoliteness. She wasn't good—she wasn't bad. She simply was alive, which, by comparison, all things considered, was probably on the positive end of things. You could do something with a living person, all you could do for a dead person was go through their pockets for loose change. And at least she hadn't really snapped at him.

"Are you sure you're okay?" He sounded far more hesitant.

"I get that you're concerned, but seriously, I'm fine. It'll go away in a few hours."

He didn't look convinced, and she felt an involuntary spasm of hostility. She didn't want his sympathy, or anything else: unless he had the magic cure-all to her problems, she didn't even want to hear his voice. Immediately, she pulled everything within herself and withdrew behind a thin wall of sullen, avoidant silence.

The Pagoda of the Five Gods was significant for several reasons, first of all it was old and historic and culturally relevant to Wutai, but most importantly it was also the seat of government. Shinra had set up shop there. Not everyone was in a military-type uniform, but that wasn't as surprising as how difficult it was to recognize the area.

Liz had seen it before Shinra moved in, and full of people for a festival. She had been the only person in remotely foreign clothes, and still almost swept away by the energy, the noise, and the color.

It was stark and tense here, now. She could feel herself grow still and defensive and some of her irritation was replaced by nerves. Iskra and the others were in a similar state of discomfort, and they all looked at each other uneasily.

Iskra nodded at her. He'd already told her that none of them except for her spoke…whatever they called English here, in Wutai it translated more or less to that other language, so it was up to her to make like Kissinger.

She nodded, wincing. She didn't like it, and knew she wasn't a good negotiator, but she had no real choice in the matter. It had to get done, and since she was the only one available the task fell to her.

If she failed, a lot of people were probably going to die. That sort of responsibility hanging over her head made her very anxious, and that emotion eclipsed her selfish frustrations and petty complaints.

Iskra and the others, and the man who had shown enough concern about her to ask, were all staring at her, and she wasn't sure if they expected her to know exactly what to do now. She didn't, but she could string together a half-decent heading in what was probably the right direction.

Step one, find the hospital.

Present…

Liz had many phobias that were mild and easy to suppress. She had a fear of clowns, photographs, being photographed, and small spaces, among others, but there was only one that ever affected her to any real degree: heights. It got into her marrow and paralyzed her brain.

It did not help that the stupid spiral staircase that led down into the basement of the Shinra mansion did not have a handrail, and at least looked ready to collapse at any moment. She was almost glad that it was almost too dark to see the bottom. God forbid any monsters came after her here.

You have to get down there. Stop being a wuss. This isn't half as bad as getting here.

Berating herself was not helping, but alongside the fear there was a strong sense of frustration; she didn't like being afraid, but she couldn't help it. So she felt angry, too.

She moved a foot to the left, her back plastered against the curved wall. Then she shifted her weight, and flinched when the wood groaned in response.

Liz gulped.

You are such a pansy. God damn it, didn't the game pretty much let you zip right up and down, without so much as a peep about soundness?

This was going to take a while.

Several months ago…

It had not been difficult to locate the hospital, after a few questions had been asked. Liz was not against asking directions under any circumstances, although the men with her hung back. She wasn't sure if it was a man-thing or just a don't-want-to-talk thing, but nobody complained and the faceless grunt told her to go this way and turn over there, and so on.

Later it occurred to Liz that it was really, really strange to just be let into Shinra's ad hoc administrative-slash-command HQ; it seemed that it would be dangerous for Shinra security. Why wasn't the whole damn thing on lockdown with guns? Then again, all she knew was the mentality bred out of Afghanistan and Iraq, and before that a long and involved interest in history that went as deep as the general mentality behind events, so maybe experiences were different on the Planet. She still remembered being able to go into the terminal at an airport without a boarding pass, after all.

But at the time they were locating the hospital, she wasn't really thinking that deeply. She was preoccupied.

The hospital was not an actual building, except for a few prefab huts. It was in a field beyond the red pagodas and bridges that had been the Shinra's entry into Wutai. The rest of the hospital complex was a big, lit up white tent, and a collection of smaller tents which served unknown purposes. The group didn't look at them too closely or wonder about them.

They went inside the biggest prefab building, which had a sign over it, and it was there Liz she realized just how arrogantly lax Shinra security really was here. There was SOLDIER crawling all over the place, but no one questioned them. Did they really think that little of Wutai's ability to resist?

She came right up to the nasty little front desk, peered over it at a bored-looking grunt, and managed to twitch her lips up into a semi-smile for an instant.

What do I say? Shit. This isn't fucking cotillion, just say something. Say what you need.

"Hi. Where's the guy in charge here. I need to talk to him."

He blinked at her rather slowly, caught off guard.

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but...who are you?" He leaned to the side, and peered at the little group behind her. "And...who are they?"

Liz knew better than to talk to someone low on the totem pole. They often couldn't get anything done by themselves, not necessarily through any fault of their own except their level of authority.

"Who is in charge here?"

"Why do you need to see him?"

At that point a SOLDIER 3rd class wheeled by, and apparently his only ailment was being heavily—heavily—intoxicated. He was singing some song Liz didn't know the words or tune to, so it mostly sounded like lilting gibberish. He passed through swinging double doors and suddenly his voice was muffled.

Liz stilled for just one moment, processing the sight with a feeling of benumbed mortification.

"Because that's above your fucking paygrade," she snapped suddenly, turning on the young man with a mean glint in her eyes. "Now get me someone who can get shit done."

The young man stared at her, offended but not cowed.

"Ma'am, there's no need to be rude," he said, firm and calm. "What is it that I can help you with."

She was not calmed, and instead it came out sharp.

"Let me put this very simply. You are aware Shinra firebombed the old part of Wutai, pretty much to the ground, right?"

"Yes," he said, with a slight frown. His eyes flicked to the small group behind her, and suddenly the confusion seemed to clear into a look of intelligent acuity. However, instead of blurting out anything, he chose to let her finish—perhaps to make sure that he had come to the right answer.

"Well, that killed a lot of people. It injured a lot more. People who aren't dead yet, but pretty much damn well will be if something isn't done for them. That is why I need to speak to whoever is in charge."

The young man gave her no more trouble and paged a Colonel Gates immediately.

Colonel Gates took one look at them when he walked into the receiving room—from the same outside door they had come through—and stopped dead in his tracks. He wasn't in SOLDIER, but he wore a uniform like Heidegger's, only less fancy, and Liz briefly wondered about that. The regular Shinra army hadn't been a very big part of the game.

"How did you all make it past the gate?" he asked, his thin face a vision of surprise.

"Wasn't no gate," Liz said. "We just walked right in."

"You must be joking."

"No, I'm pretty sure I'm not."

The young man behind the counter seemed to shrink back, his eyebrows all the way into his hairline, while Colonel Gates looked aghast. It soon melted into anger, which almost instantly faded away, replaced by composed calm.

"...Was that not supposed to happen?" Liz asked dryly.

"No, it wasn't." He eyed the group with a distant frown. "...This is an emergency?"

She explained the situation again, and the Colonel relaxed just a little. He nodded in agreement when she asked for help—then she nearly crumpled in exasperation when he spoke next.

"I can order the transport of supplies, that's not a problem and we have more than enough, but as for medical personnel, you'll need to speak with Dr. Byron. He's responsible for the medical staff and can tell you if they can spare any hands."

If they can spare any hands. They better. It's all their fault.

Colonel Gates led them down a hallway, saying that he would take them right to Dr. Byron's office and get the man himself for her.

"What's going on?" Iskra said, coming up to her elbow and staring suspiciously at the Colonel.

"Well, this guy says he can help us with stuff and transport, but as for getting doctors to come out we have to talk to somebody else."

"They won't bring the people here?" Iskra cried out indignantly.

Colonel Gates stopped, and stared blankly at Iskra.

"What did he say?"

"He wants to know why you can't just bring the injured here."

"We have limited beds." Liz was about to argue—he was not telling her what she was pretty sure he was telling her, or that's what she told herself—but he interrupted first. "Wait here. I'll see what I can do."

There were a lot of ifs floating around and Liz hated ifs, but she bit her tongue and allowed him to leave them in an office that was just big enough, and over-decorated enough for a small ad hoc tent-hospital, to be called obnoxious. No one needed this much cheesy crap, even in a permanent office, and Shinra had only been here since that morning.

She should have known to take more note of that.

"What the hell is going on!" the youngest man with them cried out as soon as the door shut, turning an angry glare on Liz. "Where are we. What are we doing, waiting here like this?"

"That's enough," Iskra snapped, cutting him off. Iskra looked at Liz steadily. "Please, explain to us what's going on."

She explained as well as she could, although they didn't look too happy to hear it.

"So they've just shoved us off into a little corner. You need to get out there and make them help us," the youngest man snarled.

"Ikari, shut up," the man who had asked about her health said. "You aren't helping. She said that this Colonel was willing to give us supplies and transport them, and he agreed immediately, and he's bringing the man in charge of the doctors. That's what we want. We just have to wait a little. What are you complaining about?"

"You shut up, Ren," Ikari snapped back. "I bet she's not even telling the truth about what they're saying. They're not going to help us. I bet we're all going to get shot."

Liz froze.

"Excuse me?" she cried out in frustration. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean!"

"If they were going to shoot us, they wouldn't take us to the third floor," Iskra said, calm as always. "She has done nothing to deserve such treatment. Apologize."

"No," Ikari retorted petulantly. "I won't."

"Why did you come along, if you can't trust me!" Liz said. "If you don't trust me, why did I come along! Why didn't you just find somebody from Wutai who speaks the other language!"

"I apologize for my cousin," Ren said suddenly, breaking off the sudden spike of tension that would almost certainly have resulted in a fight. "He's just worried, but that's not an excuse to abuse you. We really appreciate your help. Thank you." He sent a quelling glare at Ikari, who subsided into silence and turned away from the group.

She would have probably done it even with all of them throwing insults at her the whole time, but she did appreciate the apology. She shrugged rather awkwardly and nodded at him with a tight but genuine smile.

"You're, uh, welcome. With any luck, this Dr. Byron will be as willing to help as Colonel Gates was," she said, without inflection. She leaned against the table, and crossed her arms, directing her stare towards the floor.

It was actually all very surprising to her; she hadn't thought Shinra would be forthcoming.

There had to be a catch somewhere. Even if the average person was not so bad, Shinra was sinister. She was cynical to the last by nature and Shinra wasn't known for being reliable or honorable. To her the whole organization resembled another.

She was near the window, and she let her eyes drift towards it. Through the glass she could see, three floors down, the wide field that separated the red pagodas that still stood in Wutai and the hospital. SOLDIER was in the vast minority; they were recognizable by their uniforms.

Liz frowned, about to open her mouth and comment.

The door slammed open.

"We can't spare anyone," a slightly falsetto voice barked into the office.

She jumped up, startled, and her arms half un-crossed.

"Excuse me? Who the fuck are you?" Liz barked back, as her wide-eyed stare fell on a man with a pencil mustache and no chin.

"I'm Dr. Byron, and you—"

"I don't give a fuck who you are!" Liz interrupted. "You listen to me—"

"No, you listen to me," he said, and his voice, although not a shout, was loud enough to drown her out and authoritative enough to jar her into stopping. "I don't know how you managed to get in, but—"

"We managed to get in because your security sucks," she shot at him. "And we are not leaving until we work out some relief for the people y'all bombed to hell."

"I've already said: we cannot spare anyone."

"When we came in here, they were wheeling in some shitfaced asshole, and all you need for that is to wake up with a bottle of water. You're seriously telling me you're tied up with shit like that? Where is that Colonel. He outranks you, right?"

"We've been ordered to remain inside this compound. Even the Colonel can't disobey an order from Midgar—"

"Your entire justification for going into Wutai," she interrupted, her voice both loud and violent. "Excuse me. What you told people you were going into Wutai for was to improve people's lives, right? Are you going to leave a lot of people to die? Because that's what's going to happen if you don't do something. Fucking hypocrite."

The doctor's eyes widened angrily. Doctors, as a general rule, do not like being told what to do, let alone to shut up. They tell other people what to do. That's their job. A half decent doctor is one part self-assuredness and three parts intelligence, especially because most of the time what's most important in a crisis situation is the ability to make a rational decision.

"Well, what do you want me to do?" he sneered.

"I want you to help us," she snapped. "Trust me, they don't want your help. But they need it. Tell them it's a humanitarian effort! Go nuts with the PR! I don't care. Just do something!" Liz ground herself to halt. She had said all the most meaningful stuff, and although she really wanted to continue and berate him, she bit the inside of her cheek and forced herself to shut up even though she shook like an overexcited little dog.

For a few seconds the two stared at each other.

"How many people?" he asked suddenly, his entire voice shifting into one of professional, intense concentration. Liz's back stiffened, and she straightened up a little more. It took her a second or two to regroup from expecting a fight.

"Maybe a couple hundred? They're pulling them out of the wreckage."

"What sort of injuries."

"All kinds," she said, and at the impatient flash in his eyes she got a lot more specific. "I'm no expert. Lots of surface wounds. We've tried to patch them up as good as possible. Some have burns; some have internal burns from breathing hot gases. Bone fractures, crushed limbs. You name it, somebody's probably got it."

"Where are they? Can we drive there?"

Liz shook her head.

"Y'all blitzed it," she said, and steadfastly ignored the mild look of confusion on the man's face. Even though the word didn't exist in that meaning in this world, he could pick it up from context, and as long as she didn't make a big deal, chances were little would come of it. People said funny things all the time. "And you couldn't have drove through there anyhow. Streets're too narrow. There any helicopters?"

The doctor shook his head, but snapped an order over his shoulder.

"I'm sure we can find something," he said. "What's your name?"

She hesitated.

Come on, stupid!

"Liz," she said.

"Are you with Shinra?" he asked, his eyes peering down at her.

"No, I'm...here for research," she said, shaking her head. "Most of the scholarship is focused on the literature and upper class culture. I was studying the southwestern district."

His eyes reflected interest, but he suppressed it.

"What's your name, again?" she asked, rather flatly, leaning to one side and tilting her head. His name hadn't really registered when she was seeing red.

"Dr. Byron," he said. "Pleasure to meet you, Liz."

"It's nice to meet you too."

No, it's not. Dickhead.

"Is Liz a nickname, or is that your full name?"

She blinked at him. Who cared what her full name was? As far as anyone here was concerned, Liz was the end all, be all of what she went by. She didn't need anything more.

Liz was saved from having to bother to lie that it was her full name—just Liz. No last name, no middle name, no full first name—by the office door opening. A busty secretary spilled in, waving a thick chart at Dr. Byron.

Pamela Anderson's twin sister one dimension removed gave Dr. Byron the chart and flounced out again with a coy smile (and a surreptitious dirty look directed at the only other present female), while Liz sat there feeling offended that the woman even entertained the idea that Liz could be making a move on Byron. He was definitely not her type. She didn't do doctors.

"What's that?" she asked, leaning her head to the side and peering at the stack of papers, because otherwise they would fall into awkward silence. She knew more or less what doctors' charts back home looked like; when she had been a kid her dad had had her help once or twice with his. The doctor's office didn't scare her; incompetent doctors scared her.

"Oh, just charts."

Liz bit the inside of her lip before she demanded that he say what kind of charts they were. Byron didn't sound as if he was likely to tell her.

"Huh."

He had given up surprisingly fast, changed his initial position. In her experience it wasn't the conscience that was the deciding factor in such reversals, which meant that there was something more material at stake. Maybe he might have cared about the PR, but that wasn't his department so she wasn't sure if that was the case. She didn't know. She wasn't psychic.

Maybe it would be better if she just didn't try to cross bridges she hadn't come to yet.

"What are you allergic to?"

She jumped, and looked at him with her eyebrows drawn together.

"Huh?"

"You're about as red as a tomato. What are you allergic to?"

It took her a moment to realize that he was asking about—

"Oh. I don't know. I'm pretty sure it's something to do with the bombs Shinra drops."

He looked startled, for once, and his eyes widened.

"This isn't as bad as it's been," she said, with a shrug.

"It's been worse than that?"

"Yeah. I almost died once." Of course that was probably an overstatement, but Dr. Byron didn't have to know and it was easier than saying I think I might have almost, died but I'm not sure, anyway it was a little hard to breathe for a while.

He stared, and then jerked to life.

"Some people have been found to be very allergic to Agent Navel, but...never that bad."

"Agent Navel?" she asked, finding herself not entirely enamored by the name.

"It's what they use for trace—"

"There's no jungle here."

Dr. Byron gave her the strangest look, and Liz bit her lip, smiling, and coughing a laugh.

"What? I was going to say; it looks bad. Do you want an antihistamine?"

"I'll be fine."

It wasn't that she didn't want an antihistamine. She would kill for one, but this wasn't a Wallgreens back home. She didn't know if she could have an averse reaction to medicine here. Sometimes being an overeducated idiot pissed her off. It meant she thought about a lot of asinine little things that wouldn't occur to anyone else.

"Liz?" Iskra said, looking between the doctor and her with an expression of concern.

"I think—I'm working on it," Liz said, grateful for the moment that none of them understood the conversation. Throughout the shouting match they stood there in stunned silence, and now they were squirming uncomfortably. She looked at the doctor.

She still hadn't gotten a confirmed yes, we'll do it out of them. There had to be a catch, somewhere. She was expecting disaster, although she couldn't tell where it was coming from yet.

"For that matter, what butcher sewed your face up, anyway?" Dr. Byron asked.