Beep…Beep…Beep…Beep. That incessant sound occurring over and over again. It was enough to make a guy go crazy. This was Reno's waking thought. He opened his eyes woozily and instantly wished he hadn't. The harsh light bounced happily off the stark white walls of the room he found himself in. He rose a heavy hand to shade his eyes and found with mild horror that tubes were coming out of the back of his hands, wrists and nose.
"Fuck!" he exclaimed hoarsely, jerking at the sickening thought that these little plastic tubes were sitting comfortably inside him. By pure will power he refrained from pulling them out there and then.
"…"
Reno sensed a presence in the room and glanced upwards through his messy red hair. Rude was sitting on a plain chair silently, one leg relaxing on the other knee, arms crossed, eyes covered with shades making his face virtually unreadable.
"How'd I get here, yo?" Reno asked, though his voice slurred incoherently due to the drugs still in his system.
"You're in Edge hospital," Rude explained, obviously trying to avoid Reno's question.
"I know that much, yo," Reno replied, "but how did I get here?"
"Don't you remember?" Tseng butted in as he and Elena chose to enter the room at that very moment. Elena wore a stupidly wide grin, raced over to the bed and none too gently hugged Reno.
"Get off me woman!" Reno yelled, but he was grinning too. Elena retreated and looked teary,
"Oh Reno, I was so worried that you wouldn't pull through" she sniffed; Tseng gave her a glare which screamed 'shut up'. There was a brief pause as the reunited Turks looked at each other, relishing the short period of peace that they rarely shared as a team.
As usual, it was the authoritive voice of Tseng that broke the blessed silence.
"Reno, can you actually recall exactly where you have been these last few days?" his nonchalant tone caused Reno to roll his eyes out of habit.
"This is not a matter to be taken lightly, you almost died. Now when one of my Turks goes missing and then reappears on a doorstep half dead, I personally find it rather alarming."
Reno raised a thin eyebrow, "YOUR Turks?"
"Yes. In case you haven't noticed I am your superior."
"Don't remind me," Reno drawled, attempting to look as bored as possible.
"It is my responsibility to keep you under control, out of hospital and on the field in a mission."
"Well looks like yer gonna have to work a bit harder cos you failed on all three there yo," Reno retorted. They both glared at each other for a moment.
"Reno…" Tseng began with a weary sigh, but instead of finishing his sentence he seemed to rethink it and exited the room. Elena spared a quick sympathetic glance in his direction before following loyally. This left only Rude and Reno in the hospital room once more.
"You'd think he'd cut me some slack y'know?"
"…"
"Rude…don't ya think he shouldah…Rude?"
Rude was looking at him in the same way Tseng had done, that sort of worried albeit suspicious look.
"You haven't said what happened to you yet," Rude said.
Reno closed his eyes. He could easily change the subject with Tseng, backchat to him until he got too annoyed to even bother asking him any further. Rude on the other hand knew Reno all too well, probably even better than he knew himself.
"Y'know, the usual. Hate crimes against the Turks because of whats happened with this meteor shit. I admit, I got in too deep," Reno explained absentmindedly, avoiding eye contact with his friend.
"I tracked down the gang that attacked you, you could have easily taken them on," Rude countered, not a single muscle in his face betrayed the feeling of concern he was hiding under the surface. Reno seemed to not hear and was idly picking at the needles and tubes protruding from his skin. Rude carried on, unperturbed.
"You turn up in my apartment drugged up to your eyeballs, bleeding all over the place and you're not even telling us why," Rude's voice sounded strained all of a sudden. Reno's attention swapped to his goggles lying on the bedside. He reached out to grab them and expertly pulled his heavy fringe back so the eyewear sat neatly on his head. Now he could see through the thick red hair, now he could see the irate face of Rude.
The larger man stood up from his chair suddenly, scrapping the bottom of the chair legs against the tiled floor. Reno closed his eyes as if attempting to fall into a deep slumber.
"God dammit Reno! Why can you not just cooperate for once?" Rude shouted. This got Reno's attention. The red head Turk had never heard Rude yell like that. Sure he had raised his voice in missions, over gunfire and such, but now the booming voice was directed solely at him. He opened his eyes slowly and set them on Rude's angry features.
Then, surprisingly to Reno, Rude reached upwards and slipped off his sunglasses. Underneath, the soft chocolate brown eyes appeared pained and pleading.
"Reno," he said, softly now. "Rufus is going to want a report on what occurred. Its best to tell me first."
"Why?" Reno spoke up for the first time during the conversation.
"Just so you don't say anything stupid…of course," there was that rare hint of amusement that Reno sometimes felt from Rude.
"We wouldn't want that would we?" Reno answered.
"Indeed. So, tell me everything…"
Reno took a deep breath. This situation reminded him briefly of when he was sitting in bed retelling his story to Tifa. The pain in his chest flared up again. He realised that he missed the bar tender, would he tell Rude that? Reno began in the exact same way as he had done when telling Tifa.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Cloud uncharacteristically stood in Tifa's bedroom doorway, hand on the frame and eyes fixed on the sleeping figure before him. He had left Tifa to storm upstairs after yelling at him, for an hour, before cautiously knocking on her bedroom door to check if she was ok. She was fast asleep, cutely curled up causing Cloud to smile a little.
It seemed to Cloud that whilst he had been away something had happened to Tifa. Reno's presence at Seventh Heaven being the only thing out of place, Cloud assumed it had something to do with him. Tifa's defensive attitude for the beaten up Turk disturbed him somewhat and there was a nagging voice in his head telling Cloud that he had to find out what had gone on between the two. He loved Tifa after all. Loved her, perhaps not in the way she thought about him, for he was aware of Tifa's feelings towards him, but more in a protective sense. Above everything else, his friends meant the most to him and Tifa was his oldest and dearest friend.
Not having the heart to rouse her from slumber, Cloud retired to his own room and sat down on the edge of the bed. Running his hands through his spiky blonde hair, he noticed that the drawer of his bedside cabinet was slightly ajar. Sitting inside was the only two pictures that he owned, the picture of his friends, after Aeris had died. The second, of he and Aeris at the Gold Saucer. Cloud frowned at the pictures; he was sure that he had hidden them further inside the drawer before he had left with Denzel and Marlene. He replaced the photos back into the drawer and glanced at the clock. It was quite late and he had deliveries to do tomorrow. Usually, he would wake up and leave earlier than Tifa and occasionally he would come back after Tifa had gone to bed. It was right at that moment Cloud realised that maybe subconsciously he was still secluding himself from society, by avoiding those closest to him.
"Tomorrow," he thought, "Tomorrow, he would make an effort. Tomorrow would be different."