Chapter 2: Get Through This

One thing Tifa was used to was chaos and adrenaline. After trekking around the world in search of a mad man, the woman was no stranger to medical catastrophes. Adrenaline had a way of putting things into perspective for a person, when dealing with life or death situations. Crystal clear sight, unheard of hearing, perfect sense of smell—all these things came as perks during such situations. The side effect? The person in question often won't remember half of it. Because things are moving so fast, and emotions are building so hard, the human mind kind of shuts everything off and says 'focus'.

So afterwards, all that is left is roaring snippets of sound, flickering visions, and the rawest sections of the experience.

"What the hell happened here?" Tifa whipped to the source of the sound: one of the hotel staff.

"Get out of here!" Tifa snapped, eyes angry and voice whip tight with command.

One glance at the man on the bed sent the worker running. The brunette wondered—for a moment—if they would contact the authorities before flickering lashes caught her attention.

It always gets worse before it gets better.

After all sorts of battles, she had seen a lot of wounds. At one point, the gang had the unfortunate chance of finding out if a mastered cure materia, with the aid of a few herbs and potions, was actually able to reattach a dismembered limb. In case anyone was wondering, it was possible, though they were completely out of supplies afterwards. Considering that at the time, they had had a lot of supplies, it was an experience Tifa never wanted to repeat.

So needless to say, the bar tender had seen a lot of injuries while in the line of duty. Their so-called job description did in fact warn them of such instances. Revolution, and freedom have always come to the price of blood.

But this wasn't the various plains to set camp at, during Meteor.

"Tifa?" Cloud asked, suddenly beside her, helping her hold down thrashing limbs, "How long?"

The brunette struggled to speak as she focused on holding Vincent down without any sort of good grip—towels had a way of taking the traction out of one's hands—and attempted a breathless explanation, "He woke up a little while after I called you. Tried to say something before," Tifa sucked in a breath, the instance still vivid in her mind, "before that shit started to come out of his mouth."

The body beneath their steadying hands gave another lethal buck. Heels deep into the bed at one end, and supported merely by his shoulders at the other, Vincent's back arched high off the bed.

"Shock?" Cloud asked.

"I think."

They could hear sirens wailing, and blue eyes darted to brown ones, "We don't have much time…"

This wasn't waiting at the bar for Vincent to finally show up after his supposed death with Omega.

The radio was gravelly; the sound rich with static, but it was good enough for what they needed it for. The little device was situated on the small space between the driver and passenger seats, and steadily fed them information coming in over the local emergency frequencies.

"Hotel on the western edge of Sector 8, bordering towards the city limits, reported an emergency several moments ago. Authorities have made contact, but are requesting—" the static flared," –any patrols able to assist?"

A nervous voice, obviously hoping that speaking loud would cover his waver, spoke up, "I can be there in ten."

"Paramedics will meet you there. Hotel management says two people—one male, one female—carried a body from the hotel. Judging by the state of the room, they think it's the Stigma. Immediate quarantine is requested, teams dispatch as quickly as possible."

Tifa frowned from the backseat, and caught concerned blue eyes glancing back to them from the rear view mirror. A rumbling hack brought her attention back down to the bundle in her lap. Red eyes flickered dully at her from above the medical mask—splattered black from the inside—placed over his lower face. The bar tender brushed stray locks from his brow as gently as she could with her rubber clad fingers. Elbows deep in gloves, and wearing a mask of her own, she didn't feel very comforting.

This wasn't the ashen aftermath of Sephiroth's fiery bloodbath in Nibelheim, nor was it the agonizing moment when she saw Cloud get engulfed by an explosion he should have, by no means, survived.

This wasn't walking into the church to find Cloud floating within its blessedly flooded middle.

"Tifa, Cloud!" Marlene greeted cheerfully from the bar as she ate her Cheerios. She moved to stand, but stopped from pushing off her bar stool when she noticed that the two were hurriedly carrying something—no, someone—into the bar.

Her big brown eyes widened, as though struck, as she watched Tifa and Cloud carry a familiar, dark haired man into the bar. With the brunette carrying him by the legs, and the blonde carrying him from the under the shoulders, the two hustled the limp body to a nearby collection of tables, and set him upon it.

The little girl took in short, little breaths, and looked from their gloves, to their clean medical masks, to her Uncle Vincent's splattered one.

"Tifa?" She asked, the concern in her voice causing the pitch to rise.

Tifa spun on her, "Go grab a mask, get one for Denzel too. Put them on, and then call Reeve. Do you understand?"

Marlene tipped her chin up, after a moment's hesitation, and tried to clench her jaw tight enough to stop the tremble in her lower lip. Untrusting of her voice, she merely gave them a jerky nod, and ran up the stairs.

This was finding those dirty bandages at the Church, with Marlene.

"Tifa, close the blinds and lock the bar," Cloud barked as he headed to the stairs, "I'll grab the kit."

Before he had even said anything, she was already halfway done closing the first set of blinds, and already moving on to the next. Once the bar was subsequently left in reddish, early morning darkness, she flipped on the lights and made sure the sign on their door said 'closed'.

This was picking up the phone to hear—for the first time—Denzel crying.

"I don't know what to do," and she listened to a voice, far too young, break, "I just don't know."

Grimy fingers clutched at the hem of her clothing as she passed the table, and she cast wide eyes to the man upon it. Jerking slightly, Vincent stared at her with eyes very much cognitive, very much aware, and very much pleading. His breathing came in painfully short, gagging breaths that required the older man to expel his breath just as quickly as it came in; too much mucus in his airways.

She took the trembling fingertips, and laced his hand with her rubber clad one, "You're going to be okay," she said strongly, for the both of them. She tried to ignore the way the black ooze from his fingertips smeared onto her gloves.

Tried to ignore the way the black marred the yellow.

This was holding a boy in her arms that didn't hold her back, and stared at her with eerily familiar green eyes.

"Dear God," came a voice as the door chimed its welcome.

Tifa whirled on him as Cloud was setting up the emergency oxygen kit they kept, "Reeve!"

Reeve looked to her, his expression still shocked, but his eyes focused, "I ran a few lights, but I'm here. Not too late, I hope?"

Tifa shook her head and waved her hand at the small kit on a nearby table, stocked with gloves and masks, "We were hoping we would never need them again."

The WRO Leader grimaced at the sight of the kit, but approached it regardless. Mask on and halfway through donning a pair of rubber gloves that suspiciously looked like yellow cleaning gloves; he chanced a glance at Vincent. Reeve asked, "This doesn't have anything to do with that Hotel, does it?"

Tifa pursed her lips, but did not deny it. At the table, Cloud was removing the gunk-spattered mask from Vincent's mouth, and preparing to replace it with the oxygen mask. With the hindering mask gone, Vincent gasped and tried to speak through the chaos of the moment.

All that left the dark haired man's lips were a series of gurgles, and chokes that didn't sound anything like English. Cloud frowned, began to clean Vincent's mouth as best he could, before placing the mask over his friend's face.

"Hold on," the blonde said softly.

This was walking into an alley filled with black sludge that had nothing to do with pollution, or littering, only to find a young girl carrying the dead form of her even younger brother on her back, eyes shining bitterly.

"He needs medical assistance," Reeve argued as they watched over Vincent's somewhat more stable state.

"This has worked in the past," Cloud retorted, and Tifa rounded on him.

"Yea, for Denzel. But after the initial attack that brought him here, we never had to deal with anything very serious again. Some struggled breathing, and a few late night clean ups but," she waved her hand at the now unconscious man laying upon one of their tables, "never anything like this. Never anything this serious."

Reeve placed his hand upon Cloud's shoulder, "I understand the need for secrecy on this matter, but without the proper medical attention, I don't think a simple vat of oxygen is going to pull him through this."

"We take him to the Church."

"And what?" Tifa breathed in exasperation, "The water is gone, Cloud. Reeve is right, Vincent needs a hospital."

Reeve smiled grimly, "I never said that, Tifa."

This wasn't something, despite her immense experience with the situation, that Tifa Lockhart knew how to fight.

"I know someone who can help," Reeve said.

Tifa was sitting on one of the chairs that survived their cleaning spree, legs crossed, arms folded, and growled, "I can't believe we let them in here."

Cloud frowned, and addressed her from the bar, "This isn't about Rufus, is it?"

Tifa stood, and let out a whispered bark of anger, "Of course this is about ShinRa! I don't trust him farther than I can throw him."

Cloud chuckled, "You could probably throw that man a decent distance, Teef."

Tifa glared at him, and Cloud held out his hands in surrender. A bad joke, but a needed point.

Cloud resumed with his cleaning of the dark wood of the bar top, "He's helping us out, again, Tifa. Don't bite off his head."

"I know!" Tifa snapped, and at Cloud's reproaching gaze she took a slow breath, and sighed, "I know."

Cloud nodded, "It's frustrating. We're all a bit frayed. Maybe you should rest a bit, Tifa."

The brunette walked over to the bar and sat at a stool beside where the blonde was cleaning, and said, "We're all tired," and placed her hand over his to still his movement. He paused, and then released the cloth in surrender. When she was stressed, she needed to release it with biting words, and fists. Oddly enough, it was he who cleaned when worried. Throughout the initial spread of GeoStigma, he could often be found cleaning Fenrir, his bike.

His sword already sat shined in the corner. Two hours ago he had an excuse to clean. They needed to sanitize the area, which included disposing of most of the furniture that came in contact with the situation at hand, scrubbing the door, the floors, and anything that they may have brushed over the past day. It was a lot of cleaning, but it kept them moving, and their minds off of what was happening down stairs, in the old cellar they once used when they called themselves 'Avalanche'.

The cellar had been converted into an emergency room. Packed with an array of supplies, a bed, and a few pull out cots stored under that bed, there was more than enough reason to put Vincent down there once he was stable enough to move. The kids were upstairs, hopefully watching the movie Tifa popped in for them. Granted, watching a movie probably wasn't very fun when the mask on your face stood as a constant reminder of what was happening.

Tifa brushed her fingers over her own mask, and sighed. They had gotten the things once Aerith's rain had healed a majority of Midgar, back when GeoStigma was still a thriving force to be reckoned with. Despite the healing rains, other parts of the world were still infected severely, not to mention that not everyone had been outside when it rained, nor did everyone follow the orders Aerith gave during her citywide phone call. Not to mention that the rain, obviously, did not span the entirety of the whole world. Scientists immediately began to work on transforming the rain into a cure. The cure was sent to countries all over, but the disease was still present…still dangerous.

Originally, the disease only had two ways to spread: by touching the excess bodily fluids of someone infected, or by first hand contact with the infected Life Stream during Meteor. Shortly after the first waves of GeoStigma struck, it was released that anyone who did not have GeoStigma could not catch the disease without coming in contact with a victim. Immunity, they called it. Midgar had received the blunt of the blow from the Life Stream. But it only takes one infected person to move to a new place—to infect a new person—for a disease to start moving.

Months after Aerith's rain, it was feared that the disease would evolve to prevent its extinction. Some physicians feared the disease would go airborne, better and stronger than before. Though there was no medical experimentation upon the idea—seeing as the disease had nearly been wiped out—Cloud and Tifa took no chances. After the last cases of GeoStigma were dealt with, the two considered throwing the kit away, but after everything they went through, they knew it was better to be paranoid than caught without supplies should a sudden flare up roar through the city of Midgar.

And then this happened.

There was no reason to believe it was airborne. But while GeoStigma reacted differently for everyone, its initial appearance was slow. Until Reeve told them they could put the masks away, they wouldn't be taking any chances.

Which led Tifa back to thinking about the men in her basement.

Rufus ShinRa, Reno, and Tseng.

Tifa scowled, and looked to Cloud.

"Don't worry," he said, "we'll have everything sorted out soon enough."

The bar tender rested her chin upon her now gloveless hand, and sighed, "I just wish Cid would get here already. I don't want the kids to see this again."

Cloud's smile ticked downward, and he made his way behind her. The blonde rested his forehead against the curve of the back of her neck, and shoulder.

"We'll get through this."