Disclaimer: Does not own. Does not want that much paperwork and responsibility. No thank you. Does want Tonberry, though. Tonberries are cute. … At least until they stab you.

Brevity

Chapter 35: Waiting Room Interlude

"I think you should put me down now…"

Given the greenish tinge to the girl's face and the queasy way she said it, Sephiroth decided to follow her advice, and hastily set her on her feet. She swayed for a moment, but managed to brace herself against a tree trunk well enough to remain standing. Somehow, Mara kept the contents of her stomach where they belonged and not all over the General's shoes, but for a few horrible moments, it was a close battle. She rested her forehead against the tree bark, breathing in deeply and comforted a little by the scents of wood and sap and growing things.

It wasn't until she straightened, turning toward Sephiroth and trying to make her eyes focus on him, that she realized her head hurt like a mother%$^& #. Wincing, she rubbed the tender spot, and was somewhat confused to find something wet in her hair. For a moment, all she could do was stare at the smear of red covering her hand, but there was something fuzzy blocking the panic she vaguely noted she should probably be feeling right about now. "My brain is leaking…" she said blandly, then giggled, paused, and frowned, thinking maybe that wasn't as funny as she thought it was right now. It sounded a little serious, actually… "Oh, shit, my brain is leaking," she repeated, staring down in numb horror at the blood on her fingers. "I thought brains were gray… Oh, no! What if I'm a zombie…?! Are zombie-brains red…?"

"Ok, I think we should go to the clinic now," Sephiroth cut in, taking her arm gently and leading her through the woods toward the town. He was wary of carrying her again, as she seemed to get a little sea sick last time, and he didn't care to be covered in puke. In the end, they arrived at the clinic with the young lady leaning heavily against him, but still technically standing on her own two feet, dammit!, and the SOLDIER First was more than thrilled to hand her off to the nurse for proper medical care. He was also terribly relieved those wings he'd glimpsed were no longer visible, as he didn't even know how to answer the awkward questions that would inevitably be asked if they were. That thought reminded him of a horribly unpleasant duty that he should probably tend to while the girl was getting treated…

With a quiet sigh, he stepped out of the clinic. For a moment, he debated whether he should walk the short distance to the inn and inform the others of what had happened and where their missing friend was, which would involve yet more questions he had no answers for and actually seeing his friends again, face-to-face, for the first time since they'd deserted… or he could take the simple, efficient, and much less emotionally turbulent route of instant messaging. He consented that it felt like cheating as he hit 'send', but reasoned that someone should stay at the clinic to wait. It didn't make him feel much better. Neither did the fact that, just as the door to the waiting room closed behind him, he heard a distant shout that sounded like Genesis, and he glimpsed at least two persons exiting the inn. Resigned to the fact that this would be a very long afternoon, Sephiroth settled into a chair and waited.

"WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?!" Genesis roared as he burst through the door only moments later, apparently unconcerned with the fact that he was entering a hospital. Thankfully for Sephiroth, the hospital was rather small, and Mara was separated by nothing more than a curtain. Though she'd probably have heard the red-head regardless…

"I feel out of a tree!" she chirped, sounding miraculously proud of herself as she leaned dangerously over sideways on her chair and peered around the cloth. Sephiroth was interested to note that her unexpected cheer stopped the impending tirade in its tracks, and Genesis stood there, blinking dumbly at her for several seconds.

"What were you doing in a tree?" he asked, fascinated despite himself.

"Falling out of it, obviously," came a smooth voice from behind them. Mara glared past the SOLDIERS, frowning indignantly at Tseng. He was mildly disturbed by the blood caking on her forehead, and this—the fact that he actually cared— more than anything else unnerved him more than he ever wanted to admit. Especially aloud, and never in front of any SOLDIERS, in particular.

"Not on purpose…" she pouted, glancing away, and he noticed a bit of glassiness in her eyes as well. "The tree just stopped being where I thought it was…"

"Oh, so the tree moved! Now I understand," Tseng sassed impressively.

Perhaps her concussion was a bit more severe than he'd initially estimated, the doctor wondered when his patient grinned and nodded at Genesis. "See, he knows what's up." Then she turned to him and whispered loudly. "That guy knows what's up."

"I see…" he murmured, thinking he definitely needed to take some x-rays.

Mara was made to wait with the others while said x-rays were being developed and examined, though thankfully, they'd at least cleaned most of the blood off and out of her hair, and she now sported a shiny white bandage. It seemed the doctor had thought her condition mild enough to use a low-level Cure spell, too, and she was a bit more coherent now. "You don't all need to wait here," she pointed out, looking around at the seven gentlemen taking up the entirety of the waiting room. And also making the nurses very, very nervous, she noted.

Genesis, never one for tact when snark would do, snorted. "It's not like there's anything else to do in Mideel."

"I actually have to agree with him on that," Zack added, stunned. "This is literally the most exciting place in town."

"…Why do I get the feeling you think emergency rooms are the most exciting place in any town…?" Angeal asked his student with a sigh.

"Well, technically they are the most exciting places, just… not the nice kind of excitement…" Mara offered thoughtfully.

"You've been to a lot of emergency rooms, haven't you…?" Tseng guessed, giving her a wry smirk.

She flushed, looking distinctly embarrassed, and he knew he'd guessed correctly. "I have no idea what you're talking about," she replied as airily as she could.

The other Turk decided to join in the fun, then. "It has to have been at least three," he surmised, gauging her reaction. "Yup, at least. I'm guessing somewhere between 5 and 8…"

Mara was immensely relieved when the nurse called her back to look at her x-rays before they reached double digits.

"Drink this, and don't eat anything for a few hours. No sleep for another five, and don't be surprised if your memory is a bit off for a few days." With that, the doctor signed a form and bustled off, leaving the nurse to the task of discharging the patient. She passed Mara a cup full of a strange, grayish broth and set about filling out the required paperwork. Grimacing, the girl stared into the murky liquid, seriously hating her lack of equilibrium. With a sigh of self-disgust, she steeled herself and drank. It was like drinking gym socks. The nurse's somewhat amused assertions that "it happens to everybody" as she lost the lunch she hadn't eaten did nothing to heal her already-shattered dignity.

It really sucked that she wouldn't be able to eat for a while, or even take a nap to avoid the questions and teasing she knew were waiting for her. It was almost a blessing she couldn't focus on more than one uncomfortable thing at a time right now, or she'd be too nervous to walk as she made her way back to her party in the waiting area. As it was, she thought it was more important to keep whatever contents were left in her stomach in her stomach. Mercifully, the others noticed the greenish tinge beneath the stark white bandage, and decided to wait until they were at least back at the inn where she could have a trashcan at the ready and a comfy chair to sit in before they hounded her with questions.

It seemed the three most powerful SOLDIERS and two Turks were more than enough leverage to convince the owners of the place to rent them the lounge area for a few hours, and Mara was more than ok with that, as she got all the hot tea she could drink out of the deal. She was on her second cup when Angeal finally spoke up; it wasn't all that surprising that he'd been voted the spokesman of the group.

"This may not be the best time, but we need some answers…" he began, looking uncomfortable, and Mara was a little calmed to note that she wasn't the only one very much ready to slink off and hide in a corner somewhere. "If you aren't comfortable speaking with all of us at once, that's fine, and we understand, but, please, talk to one of us…" the peaceful man implored, and Mara couldn't help but feel a little guilty that she'd kept them so in the dark because she was feeling a little socially awkward.

Then again, she was already pretty socially inelegant, and when she was worrying about it, it made it infinitely worse. She'd never be able to forget the time she'd blanked on a question in class and spent several minutes talking about the newest dinosaur fossils instead. Her math teacher hadn't been impressed. Neither had her classmates. It had done nothing to dampen her enthusiasm for dinosaurs, though it had made her hesitant to open her mouth again for a few weeks. Still, that was then, and this was now, and Vincent still owed her a dinosaur, so everything would be fine. Right?

"Um… I don't mind all of you staying, as long as it's only one question at a time," she replied, voice quiet, and not as sure as most persons present had heard it before. Genesis subtly checked that he had a Cure materia on him, just in case her injury was worse than they'd realized and haughtily ignoring the voice in his head that sounded remarkably like Angeal and insistently whispered 'I told you so'.

Angeal nodded, and instantly took it upon himself to moderate the conversation, and intervene if it started to look like the girl was feeling any worse. "Very well."

"What first?" she asked quietly, and in such a resigned tone it made the new Turk in their ranks laugh softly.

"You can relax, first of all," he told her, his voice remarkably friendly despite his less-than-pleasant line of work and the fact that he was still technically on duty. "This isn't an interrogation. If there are questions you don't want to answer, we won't make you. But we will become terribly curious and might possibly stoop to tapping phone lines should we ever get really bored."

Mara laughed, and found herself actually relaxing. Perhaps it was a little dangerous, but such deep-rooted familiarity brought with it an almost instant trust of these people, and she was relatively confident that none of them would hurt her. Or laugh at her. Well, ok, so they probably wouldn't laugh at anything she said, at least in a serious moment. But she really couldn't blame them for laughing at the things she did. Because, she had to face it, she did some pretty stupid shit sometimes. Like falling out of a tree. And having to be taken to the emergency clinic by none other than the Great Sephiroth. That was her; the comedic relief.

"I would still like to know what you were doing in a tree," Genesis pointed out, and his indignation at being ignored earlier was more amusing than perhaps it should have been. Mara was learning quickly that Genesis did not like to be ignored, and she found it absolutely hilarious. She had far more fun ruffling the SOLDIER's feathers than was perhaps healthy for anyone within a ten-mile radius.

But regardless of the fact that she liked to tease the drama queen, she did owe him answers, at least the ones she could give, and even if she wasn't really looking forward to sharing. She took a deep breath, telling herself it would be fine, and told them the truth. "You know that voice you captured?" she asked, glancing at the pilot, and he nodded, straightening. Tseng felt somewhat pleased to have his suspicions confirmed; he hadn't seen her, but he'd guessed the girl had been eavesdropping. He was still wholly unable to figure out what that had to do with her recent injury, though. It was obviously connected, of this he had no doubt as he watched her clutch her mug of tea nervously, letting the heat radiating into her palms anchor and steady her. Finally, she found the courage to continue. "That was the voice of my guardian angel."

Silence reigned for several long minutes, and Mara felt her face turning pink with embarrassment. She sounded nuts. Completely mad. She'd be lucky if they didn't drag her right back to the hospital and stuff her into a straight jacket. Come to think of it, did they even have mental hospitals on Gaia? Hell, if they thought she was crazy enough, they'd probably build one. She'd hate for that to be the "great change" she started, though she had to admit, it would be cruelly fitting.

"So it's true…" Angeal whispered, breaking the silence. He was watching her with some measure of understanding, and she found her fears easing, just a little.

"What is?" Zack asked, looking between his mentor and the girl in confusion.

"They really do exist… don't they…?" Angeal continued, and there was an unmistakable note of hope in his voice.

Mara, despite the seriousness of his query, was unable to completely stifle the dry laugh that escaped. "I can say with unwavering certainty that angels are quite real," she replied wryly, lips quirking upward as she recalled the moment she'd gone from simply believing to knowing.

"And what is your connection to them?" Sephiroth asked, and while Mara wasn't entirely sure how to answer right away, she was secretly pleased with the SOLDIER elite's first contribution to a conversation that didn't involve references to trees, hospitals, or concern for whatever brains she had left at this point.

"Um, well, in general, they keep me out of trouble, and I do what I can to help them sometimes," she replied, referencing her entire presence there with the latter. "If you're referring to Azriel specifically, we mutually irritate the crap out each other almost daily. If that helps…"

"…It does not…"

"Oh… well, does knowing he's the one who sent me here?"

"…It's a start," the silver General consented. Mara smirked to herself, recognizing that this would take a while, but eager for the challenge all the same.

A/N: Don't laugh, Tseng; maybe it was an Entwife! Somebody should tell Treebeard.