tell all by frooit

ffvii au - zack/cloud (primarily)

part twenty-one

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Status: Ex-bodyguard - Location: Shinra Headquarters, exec. levels

He found him under a desk.

Don't ask him how he got there either. He doesn't remember much. He could spin you a tale about the varying nuances of pain and agony, and the floating-free dissipation in his head and guts, but he couldn't tell you how he got to Cloud, exactly. Sheer will or luck, or maybe a mystical reprieve. Who knows? He had crawled and grabbed and lunged and rolled half into Cloud, half into the desk leg.

"Ouch," he said, a little bit of a downplay given the circumstances. He touched Cloud, his hand wet and slippery and cold. There was no reaction. Which was nice, really. He had feared another explosion, or a punch to the face, but the kid didn't move. He tried to shake him, using that slippery wet appendage, and only sent waves of nausea into his already unhappy system. The fingers clawed, compulsive, and dug two good picks into Cloud's knee. Starting as high as the second knuckle, thanks to the viper Masamune, three of the fingers were missing.

That's not good, he'd thought. I'll get Cloud's knee a mess.

He removed the hand and again dismissed the injury, too far gone to feel too much of anything unless agitated. It was there though, that constant buzzing, that eaten at sensation, but it wasn't enough to keep a good Reno down. He tried again, sat upright with the help of his good hand, and some bitten back moans, and he leaned, and leaned, and couldn't catch himself. He didn't end up shaking him out of his lockdown. He face-planted into his bony shoulder.

Cloud groaned.

"Come on…" Reno wheezed. "Come on… Help me…"

The blond lifted his head, his eyes, those warring colours.

Reno blinked, vision murky.

"You've got to get your ass up," he told him. "I can't…"

And that's where things went pear shaped. Again. There are glimpses, off and on, of them trudging through the corridors, Reno's arm over Cloud's shoulders, the base quiet and dark, a dense shroud around them, everyone either dead or gone, man, outta there, but they're just glimpses and flashes. Fast forward to struggle and blood, tears and things now kept only between him and Cloud, things he's not proud of. That growing shame is a real drag.

He fell many times. He cursed and flailed. He called out for his brother. How they ever made it out is more thanks to Cloud than him. He'll probably never tell him that, but he's learning that he wants to, and needs to, even if it's the result of a crash course in decency; a real trial by fire.

He can't remember Cloud saying much of anything throughout the exodus. From the desolate hallway, to the fringes of the tantalizing exit, things did improve. Reno picked the bodies of fallen soldiers and secretaries, doctors and nurses along their way. He collected several health potions and a flashlight. The resources proved enough to allow him to walk, but even two potions did nothing for the pain, or the guilt, or the fear. He can say he walked (shuffled) out of there of his own volition. Right on out of his brother's tomb.

The helicopter was a gift from the heavens. They broke the surface to leave NCB2 behind for good. He downed another potion, a mega dose and the last, and took them both up to the waiting helipad located atop the base's concrete bunker entrance. He fumbled the machine's door open and took the pilot's seat. Cloud strapped in next to him as if he'd done it all before. He didn't have a single comment. His head was loose on his neck. His eyes, underneath the fall of tangled hair, glassy and dilated.

At the very least, the weather was clear that late morning, and Reno's right hand was still functional. All the fingers were still where they should be concerning that guy. He was lucky. Real lucky. Hell, he might have been (and still is) the luckiest asshole in the world. Sephiroth could be dead, and he might be the one that hammered the last nail.

He fumbled with the helicopter's door again, leaning just his head out, and retched onto the cement and low snow drift, expelling most of the uses of the found potions. For all of it, he felt more clear headed afterward. Wiping his mouth, he swung back in and closed the door tight.

The helicopter had been in the middle of refueling and service. He might know how to fly the things but anything else was beyond his minimal training. Not to mention, patience and capabilities slash disabilities. He had flipped through the pilot's handbook years back. Trial and error did the rest. This was a military utility transport helicopter too, twice the size he was halfway familiar operating.

Under normal circumstances he knew he would have to check the rotors to make sure the blades were aligned correctly with the fuselage for proper start up. Instead, because he was injured, and his only buddy was in the clouds (stratospheric), he just hoped they were close enough not to stall out once he fired her up.

He skipped all exterior checks and ran through a handful of onboard safety routines. Fuel was a staggering fourth full in one tank, empty altogether in the other. That was a problem. Oil pressure looked steady though, and no ice appeared to have formed on the windscreen. All gauges lit up. Good enough.

"Seatbelts on?"

Cloud, over in the co-pilot's chair, he existed.

"Engine start."

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And now they're here, boom, after leaking oil and fuel into the ocean over the two hour tour to headquarters and coastal Midgar. The refueling hose detached dramatically as they first lifted off, and it's probably still there too, hanging on like a tentacle. They made it by the skin of their teeth, and by the stretch of Reno's skill. It took everything he had to level out the fat fucker for landing.

The only visitor since has been this Zack Fair, the legend dead arisen and on the war path, or so he says. Although, maybe it's Reno who's on the war path. After all that's happened to him in the last handful of weeks, he can't talk much on his own mental state. He has one definable, tangible desire, and that's to follow his brother's last words: get Cloud. So, he is going to follow them, and his duty to make amends, all the way to his own messy finish. He's going to fight and die, because that's life, that's nature, baby. Nothing else has flavour, or colour, or aroma like it did before. He's damaged goods, ruined. He's dusk without dawn, damned for inaction.

Cloud remains there in the door frame. Zack is reeling in pain, or awe, or mental relapse. All Reno marks is his glimmering chance. He's so vulnerable, this SOLDIER, hands over his lowered face, bent over, shivering and everything.

Shit, look at him. That's right. Look. Can he even do that? Or is he lying? Could they be very thin, those bandages, so he can spy through? What the hell happened to him? What is he really here for? Did Sephiroth send him?

He grips the knife, Vegas' butterfly, the only one of two he could locate (to his despair), and side-steps to Cloud.

"What's going on? Who's that?" He's just as mixed up as he is.

"That's…" starts Reno.

"It's me," Zack weakly overrides, a naked plea from under his palms.

Cloud's mouth hangs wide there a second, wanting to form a response, but he has nothing for him. There's no recollection, no knowing, and no immediate desire to amend. Reno's grip on the knife tightens all the more. It's all the indication he needs.

"Stop!" Zack shouts.

"Reno!"

The knife blade lodges deep into Zack's gloved palm. It goes in smoothly, as he put his arm out to deflect him, meeting with his own force. There the blade has stuck, stopped by the handle, unable to pass through to its target. Reno's sweaty hand trembles down to the elbow. The bloodied blade on the far side reaches on for Zack's face and jugular.

"Reno!" Cloud repeats, louder.

Zack sneers a toothy sneer, bandages red and wet and peeling. He's a brick wall. His arm isn't going to budge, or sway, or strain. He's stronger than he presents, and he shows no fear.

Reno lefts off, pulling the butterfly free with a quick flick. It trails and drips red, spots of it now everywhere. He retreats to Cloud and the door frame.

"You don't know this guy," he assures, moving them both a step back.

"I don't know…"

"Cloud..." Zack continues, suffering, stressing, but he stays put.

Reno shakes his head. "You don't know him," he insists, voice caring but assertive.

"I can't remember," Cloud mumbles. "I'm tired. My head hurts." He sways and steps back into the hallway and off the threshold.

Zack starts forward, holding out his bleeding hand. "Wait, wait, please." He looks like death and yet sounds so desperate and mortal, channeling some kind of religious figure or fanatic pleading his case. "You're not okay. You're all wrong. There's… You're…"

Reno steps between them, cutting off his ramble and direct access with his body. Cloud stops his retreat to look back over Reno's shoulder. There's Zack: bald, bandaged, bloodied. His expression must be in turmoil. He must be trying to bring any fragment of memory to the surface.

"You know me," Zack continues, blood dripping. "You're Cloud Strife, an infantryman. A new Shinra recruit. Low level. You took your first drop mission with me, your commanding officer. I'm in SOLDIER. I…" Zack twitches, a violent thing. "I was… uh, fuck." He leans over, thumps his head once, and continues. "I was... We crashed during that drop mission. And crashed again. And all this other shit. Your mother died in a fire. You were kidnapped by Sephiroth, my fucking ex-lover-whatever. I tried to save you, but I couldn't. I didn't. I messed it up. I'm here now, and you're not okay. He... poisoned and damaged you... and I'm sorry, man. I love you."

"Sephiroth…?" Cloud questions.

"Yes," Zack responds, wanting to close the distance. "He's… he's…"

Reno flashes the stained butterfly, stalling any advance. He might be half the size of Zack in muscle (they're eye-to-eye in height) but he is not deterred. It's probably his most charming quality. Next to his high pain tolerance, his love of fun, his loyalty, and his smile. And, well, the shock of red hair. That used to be a shared quality, but no longer.

"Your eye, Cloud," stresses Zack.

"My eye?"

"You lost it in the first crash."

"I…"

"That," Zack points, arm level, "Is not your real eye."

"What?" Reno interjects. "You're not telling me Sephiroth... did that?"

"You've seen it?" Zack asks.

"I guess…" Reno answers hesitantly, remembering how he found Cloud back in his bedroom in NCB2. He was just a body, a mop of hair, a heavy smell, and two different coloured eyes. One was blue, which was normal, and the other one was stoplight green, which was not normal. And, oh by the way, he's been a husk ever since.

"That's why you don't recognize me," Zack tells Cloud.

Cloud blinks, uncomfortable.

"That's why?" Reno scoffs, dismissing his observations. "It's not because you're full of shit and I should kill you? He had both eyes when I met him, yo, and they were both blue then. That doesn't mean anything. And what the fuck? Sephiroth's your ex-lover? That's not scandalous. And just more evidence not to trust you. I thought I had dirty hands."

"You love me?" Cloud whispers.

Zack answers, quick as a whip, "From the moment I saw you. The back of your spiky head."

Reno sighs. He wipes the butterfly clean on his slacks and flips it closed.

"I've never seen you before. I don't remember a crash, or Sephiroth, or..."

"You're gonna be at this a while," Reno mutters, intercepting. "I've already been there, done that. He's not… really... all there, you know? He's probably not going to remember any of this tomorrow. Or in a few hours. He's in shock, or something. I've literally gone days trying to explain that we're in hiding, you know. He just doesn't get it. He's a space cadet."

"What happened?"

"Uh… Well." Reno diverts his eyes out of habit.

"The fuck happened?"

"Sephiroth happened. He fucked him up, man," he blurts. "And I mean… fucked him up. So, yeah. I guess that goes along with your whole eye theory. That still doesn't take the responsibility off you, boyfriend. You're the catalyst. We're all the victims. My… my brother died back there. For no reason. You've got some atoning... or some dying to do."

What was weak and breaking and pleading becomes rigid and serious. Zack stands fully upright, no longer withered or wincing. The despairing arm and bleeding hand he held out to Cloud he crosses with the other over his wide chest, defined biceps now on show. His head is shaved, not well or carefully. He has many cuts and rebel tufts of ash black hair over both ears (nicked and sliced too) and at the nape of his neck. It's already grown in bristled peach fuzz. What is left of his handsome face he has set in an even and unreadable form. He's a monument, a statue: bronze, quartz, bone. He really is something.

"Where is he?" the ex-SOLDIER presses, meaning his ex-lover.

"Left his ass back at the base."

Zack does not wilt.

Cloud, however, does.

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Status: Unknown - Location: Unknown

As soon as his hands lifted from his eyes and engaged in deflecting Reno and his knife, he saw it. There, deep in Cloud's skull, rooted in his false eye, viridescent like algae or phlegm, a gangrenous growth, a gift from Sephiroth. His bleached aura had almost been enough to hide it on its own, but no. Zack wouldn't miss it. It's a spike to his heart. He's weak thinking about it. Something must be done. Something has to happen.

(...he's… he's…)

Reno will be damned if he's going to stop him from reaching out to him now. Cloud swayed and dropped, like many times Zack has before. They both rushed to gather him but somehow, thanks to his former reflexes, or just dumb luck, Zack soared forward through the door frame and got to him first. There was a moment, he sensed, where Reno wanted to attack him, his back turned and his attention consumed, but the bodyguard let it slide and gave him the moment. Likely because he already had Cloud in his arms by then.

(...you love me?...)

He carries him down the hallway, headed to his room, knowing the direction based off the glow from earlier. He sets him on the disturbed bedspread and turns to leave.

He's found him (his charm, his totem), they've been reunited. Despite everything and the cancer in his head.

"Are you blind?"

Zack stops. He doesn't think before he responds. "Yes. And no. Kind of. It's hard to explain."

"Oh," Cloud breathes.

This is killing him. This is killing him more than any mako already coursing through his circulatory system. He wants to touch him and hold him and apologize. Cloud doesn't know who he is. He doesn't seem to recall a moment of their time together, however ephemeral it was. He doesn't recall the crash, the ice shelf, the warehouse, the machine, the old man, the airship, the kiss, the next crash, the next kiss. He doesn't know of their struggle and trial. No more broken leg, damaged eye, Sephiroth, stabbing him twice, or any past feelings of murdered hope or choking fear. That might be a plus, but it means their growing closeness, the prospect of love and contentment, that's all gone now too. None of it might be left. Not a shred.

Fuck you, Sephiroth. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.

He can't entirely blame him. He doesn't look anything like he would have remembered him anyway. That only makes him want to weep or rage or repent more. He thinks. He's so messed up and down and all around. This would be the best time for it though. The one shining time for tears and sorrow and shame, but he isn't allowed. He didn't do his best at guarding messy emotions and overt signs of softness in the past. He tried to hide behind jokes and smiles and stupid shit. And the job. He's stuck now with a frown or a scowl, and the gnawing, contorted outbursts. No more relief. No more robust mama's boy. No more hero's dream.

"You're hurt."

"I know."

"You're kind of…"

Zack waits, letting him stumble through it.

"...screwed."

(...cheated, tricked, swindled, conned…)

He stares, taken.

The blond drones, "I'm on my way. I'm coming fast now."

The lights, the glow, the whole show goes on the fritz. Zack stumbles backwards as if struck. He falls into something, a table, a chair, and takes it with him. His head doesn't ache, it's flown apart. He's been slapped in the skull with a super-heated tank shell.

Reno stands in the door frame, silvery and shifting, watching, or he could be all over the damn room. Zack doesn't care anymore, he's done reading and guarding, he's kicking and struggling on the floor, fighting to stay conscious, fighting to challenge the pain. Cloud starts to scream, and only then does he break, throwing his own bellow into the mix, making it a duet. Reno screams too, jumping in, but he's screaming obscenities and words of support.

"Shit! Quit it! Stop! Yo! Everything's cool! Fuck!"

The crisis, lasting seconds, passes with Cloud falling silent. Zack is motionless, conscious but drained, back pushed up a wall, leg twitching, chest heaving. The world is pulsing green, receding like a tidal wave. Remnants of Sephiroth, his influence, power and aura, serpent green. It washes over his crackling vision, a taste on his tongue and a trembling in his watery guts. Mint, spiced tea, coppery blood. He knows and remembers him well, despite all his best efforts and fractured psyche. Even in good circumstances he's more likely to forget his favorite song, work schedule, and his mother's birthday, than any traumatic events. Those are etched.

"I've got two of you messed up fuckers now," Reno curses.

"We've got to move," Zack breathes. He stands, wobbles. He can feel fluid running from his nose, underneath his facial bandage, drooling from his mouth.

"What?" Reno asks. "Sephiroth?"

Zack nods weakly. He checks Cloud on the bed.

Reno throws his arms, two spikes of white, high into the air. "Of course he is! Of-fucking-course. Why wouldn't two rounds to the gut kill him? I should have put one in his head. Why leave, man? Let's stay and say hi. Give him a good welcome."

"You're crazy." Zack runs a hand over his sweating, smooth head. He wipes his nose and mouth. "I can't take him."

(...he deserves death… now that I have no chance at a life…)

"But, I owe him so much," Reno complains, stomping a foot.

"I can't disagree. But you're… And I'm…"

"What happened to your spunk?"

Reno's not wrong. Zack is saturated with the knowledge that he's not going to last long (or well) with this affliction. And he's not going to last to tomorrow if Sephiroth can help it. He might as well make the last stand. No one gets to choose where or when they die. You can choose how, to a degree. It's going to happen. Why not have some control? Why not challenge the cause, rather than the pain? Why has he been so set on fleeing? Is he scared? Has he lost his nerve?

(...I'm coming fast now…)

"I don't want to die in this building," he admits.

Reno shrugs. "Same here. But… Well. I might have a solution for that. I have a helicopter on the roof. It's in bad shape, and could be outta juice, but if we get to it we can get the hell outta here. Maybe. Sephiroth can play to an empty room. We'll go flaming into the night."

"We won't be able to hide either way," Zack reminds. "His eye. It'll need to be…" It dawns on him even as he's saying it. (...expunge, excise, cancel…) "Removed."

"I can't touch him." Reno shakes his silvery aura head, salt on blackboard.

"You can't?" Zack chastises.

They both look to the oblivious blond. Zack isn't thinking about it, entertaining it, or getting flash floods of soupy blood and clawed fingers and thrashing arms and kicking legs and screams. Screams for days. How can he be so sure that's his own thought? How does he know it will cure him? He's got to push it down. He's got to focus on Sephiroth's warning and arrival, and keeping his head on straight and his emotions in check.

They'll get their butts to that helicopter and coast down to the badlands. The General can meet them there, on neutral ground, and they can go at it in the choking heat and dust. Reno and Cloud, meanwhile, can hide it out, or run it out, or help his case. That's the new plan.

"Let's try then. At the least." Reno says, on board with his chopper idea. "We've been stuck in here for weeks. I gotta get outta here one way or another. You have no idea. I really need some fresh air and some action, and a fuck, and a cheeseburger. And if Sephiroth is coming, man.…"

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They emerge from the hallway and pass into the front room. Zack bends down to sweep up his sword. Cloud follows within inches of Reno, holding his hand. It's an easy thing for Zack to tell. He can't pull his gaze away, one, and two, Reno's all lit up by the walking light bulb that is Cloud. The reflection gives a perfect picture, and it's one shitty image.

"How do you do that?" Reno asks him, indicating his head. "Is there a camera in there or something?"

"I'll tell you later," Zack deflects, bubbling up inside.

"Fuck you," Reno grumbles. "Probably won't be a later."

As the two pass, bodyguard and client, headed to the exit, Zack slides a hand into Cloud's free palm, acting on instinct and emotion. He pulls just enough to jolt Cloud forward a step in his direction, locking the arm in Reno's hold and stopping him dead. It's a challenge. "Let me get that," he tells Reno, giving another soft tug. "Come here," he tells Cloud.

Cloud drops Reno's undamaged hand. The fuck you should be I'll kill you now, but he only huffs and opens the door to the hallway.

Zack might not be able to make out his shifty, partial aura on its own, but he can see every detail of Cloud's wonder. The yellow, marigold, golden rod; the flaxen tones. Sunlight through an amber vase. Early morning on a field of mustard. He's not so blinding now (he's had the time to adjust), but Cloud is still an arresting body of luminescence regardless. The details, the suggestions, every line and curve and coil a hot thread of outline. He can easily make out his lax expression, his hooded eyes, the webbed corruption deep down. He's not really seeing him, not traditionally, but it couldn't matter less.

"Your hand's cold," Cloud remarks.

Zack had reached for him with the hand Reno hadn't assaulted. He made a mental note on purpose, really pushing the importance. He looks down to it now, his own body in contrast, glowing yellow-white next to his holy shroud, the immutable light source. His immutable source. "I'm missing a glove," he notes.

"Oh," Cloud breathes.

"Get a room..." Reno says under his breath. He pushes by, the distance showering him in high relief too, offering filaments of gold and tan and bronze.

(...I've already been there, done that…)

Zack watches as Reno pauses before the door to remove his already undone suit jacket and untuck his already half-loosened dress shirt. He discards his golden tie, bright enough to match his glowing golden hair. He then brings out both firearms in sequence from their double small-of-the-back holster. One, two, the other collected from the vacant bedroom, loaded and ready. Zack has to imagine the pearl-grip, the ambidextrous safeties, the wear and tear. He imagines they match his pearl-gripped butterfly too. He doesn't imagine the three missing fingers from his left hand: index, middle, and half of the ring.

"You kids ready?" he asks, turning on a heel.

"My head hurts," Cloud mutters.

Zack starts to nod and tremors instead, hissing in the aftershock.

"Fucking circus over here," Reno mutters, and closes the suite door behind them.

They're heading to the roof and the helicopter. They'll be sure not to stop or hang out, or take any bathroom breaks. If what Zack knows to be true actually turns out to be true, Sephiroth is on his way from Shinra's hidden base on the Northern Continent at a high rate of speed. Or he's already here. If he's corrupted Cloud's head, he could have been watching and listening for weeks. They should filter what they say around him. They should be moving faster too.

"Is anyone even here?" Zack asks, lugging his sword up his shoulder, Cloud trailing behind.

Reno walks in pace with him. He shakes his head. "Not right now, no. Hardly. It was kind of a bonus. Shinra's been in all kinds of chaos. The President's dead. The Director's gone. No one knows where the Mayor is… Not that he even mattered… How the hell did he keep his job, I wonder? Anyway, no. We're alone."

"You were alone."

Zack and Reno stop their progress in unison and turn to track the intruding voice. Cloud proceeds walking on anyway, still hand-in-hand with Zack. He jerks once he runs out of slack and swings back, bumping his side.

On the far end of the floor, onyx tile a tar pit between, a figure waits.

"I thought we were," Reno admits, exhibiting no urgency.

Zack is not so calm. He's seeing what Reno can't see. The figure's aura is a warning sign from a mile off. It might not be his body, it's not nearly tall enough, but that's surely his handle, his shade, his cue. He's inside that figure, like some kind of containment vessel, hitchhiking.

The figure advances, moving swiftly, arms limp at its sides.

Zack follows his gut (and Cloud's pulling) and turns to book it down the opposite run of hallway, hand clamping his sword and Cloud's warm hand. Reno remains stopped in the middle, looking on at the figure pacing forward. He is unaware of the situation.

"Reno!" Zack shouts back.

"Reeeno," the figure taunts.

"Fuck this," he curses, and turns to follow them.

The executive elevator will ride up to the roof. It'll be easier than hoofing it, and Zack's diminished enough as it is. He can't do another marathon. This is his final act.

They wait a hairy moment for the lift doors to slide open after engaged. As they're all stepping on, Reno turning to slap at the controls, the figure is upon them. Two arms shoot through the narrowing opening, preventing the doors from closing. Reno jumps back, knocking Cloud into Zack, who stumbles into the corner, sword trapped behind him.

The figure thrashes and grabs but doesn't appear coordinated (or cognitive) enough to unwedge by itself. Reno lifts a leg and kicks, booting it right out the opening. The doors would have sealed then, no problem, but the figure is back just as quickly, a single arm now, thrashing and clawing. The thing twists and pulls, waving, caught by the forearm.

"Get out, get out!" Cloud howls.

Reno jams the close doors button, click, click, click. The figure's one arm becomes two, fingers working together to spread the doors for access. It doesn't have to stress much, the lift wasn't made with defense in mind. It then leans in, shoulders and head, mouth wide.

Zack sees a combat of green and gold. A battle of bright lights, stunning, to the literal sense. He hasn't been able to function since the thing closed the gap. He hasn't even picked Cloud up from the floor at his feet. But, soon there's a change, a challenge, a flash of angry red out in the chartreuse sheen, and he hears a discharge, a bang.

The figure bursts.

(...disintegrates, explodes, scatters...)

And the doors bump closed.

"Oh fuck! Yuck. Oh!"

Reno staggers back. His arms, his chest, and the whole of his face and the bulk of his hair, they're all covered, drenched, soaked and dripping. He's been blanketed in the figure's bits. He popped like a damn balloon. An overfilled balloon. Surprise, out he goes, everywhere and Reno.

"Fucking shit!" he's swearing, trembling, shaking his arms of filth.

Zack and Cloud dodged most of the fallout and Reno took the brunt of the yuck square to the front. It's bad enough that it's disgusting and everywhere and starting to smell, but now Zack has something that will really get him going.

"He was in there, he was in there," he rambles, coming up to paw at Reno and his face and mouth.

Reno slides away and into a wall, escaping the ministrations. "The fuck…?"

"He's in the blood, dammit!" Zack bellows.

Reno stands upright, boots squeaking. He holsters his .45 and begins wiping at his face. He doesn't have a clean sleeve or hand to help. "Oh geez," he moans. "You don't think…?"

"I don't know..." Zack's answer.

Reno rips off his shirt, using what he can to smear the mess from his eyes, lips, nose and hair. The reflection in the elevator doors assists some, enough for him to squint, but they're just as streaked as he is. He looks like the victim of a prank. And, you know, he really is.

"Fucking Sephiroth."

He spits in the corner, tossing his sopping shirt behind.

"Going up?" he chimes, grinning a forced grin, bare from the waist up, bloodied, acting the role he was born to play, and accenting Zack beautifully. He pulls a key card, inserts it into the panel, and depresses a sequence of buttons. "Let's get this over with," he growls.

Cue the lift.

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