Hey everyone, sorry I wasn't able to get this out a few days sooner. Also, hopefully there aren't parts that make no sense or have a lot of errors in them. I'm sick right now and my brain is barely functioning.

~Fifty-Two~

After his brief visit he'd had with Cloud in his and Rand's apartment, Tseng felt compelled to get Cloud's mentorship under Kunsel started as quickly as possible. He could make a lot of assumptions about what was going on in Cloud's life day to day and wouldn't know if he was correct in his thinking but after speaking to Cloud in person, he knew that at the very least Cloud needed to get away from the people who'd been his constants for months, if only for a short period of time.

Since being back in Midgar, Cloud hadn't been doing much that could fall into a training category and as far as he could tell, outside of the holiday events he'd attended, he'd been confined either to the lab or his apartment. There were legitimate reasons for getting him access to the training facilities but he also just wanted to get Cloud away from Rand and Hojo for any amount of time he could. He suspected the deck of good and bad cards he'd seen in the apartment was just a glimpse into the overwhelming amount of brainwashing Cloud had been subjected to. He was sure that if he could get him away from them regularly, he may be able to see something resembling a personality come out eventually, regardless of the brain implant and his emotional detachment problems.

He arranged with Kunsel to meet with Cloud a couple of days after he'd delivered the SOLDIER reference materials to him and was quite happy to deliver the order for him to begin training in person to the lab where Cloud was undergoing his daily tests.

"Morning Professor, Doctor Cane," he greeted Hojo and Rand as he entered the lab. The men returned the greeting and Hojo was quick to ask what he was there for. "I'll be taking Cloud off your hands for a few hours," he announced. He handed a document to Hojo, signed by the president.

"For what reason?" Hojo asked in return, taking the document from him and skimming it as Tseng answered him.

"It's time he was introduced to the training facilities," the Turk explained. In fact the president hadn't actually signed the document but the man had permitted verbally his use of a rubber stamp signature as approval to his request. He'd suggested to the president that it would be appropriate to have Cloud getting more exposure to other SOLDIERs and being able to take advantage of the training facilities since the goal was to eventually have him on work and mission rotation. The president had agreed with him.

"Well, I will be accompanying you then," Rand informed him and he shook his head.

"I'm afraid that's impossible," he argued. "The facilities are located on floors that only Turks and SOLDIERs have access to. No exceptions."

"Then I'm afraid, until there is an exception—" Rand began to reply quickly, about to make it clear to the Turk that Cloud wasn't going anywhere with him, but he was cut off by Hojo promptly.

"That's fine," the professor said, granting Tseng's request on the spot and creating a tension that was obvious to perhaps everyone in the room with the exception of Cloud. "He doesn't leave your sight, and he needs to be returned in two hours for treatment. His bloodwork will be finished by then."

"Of course, Professor," Tseng agreed.

"Was that a lie?" Cloud asked him when he was walking toward the elevators that would bring them to the training facilities.

"What?" Tseng replied, not sure what he was referring to.

"About only Turks and SOLDIERs being able to have access," Cloud clarified.

"Not at all," Tseng told him. "Hojo knows the rules," he added. When they were in the elevator he had to look twice to be sure he wasn't imagining the smile Cloud had on his face.

"What is it?" Tseng asked him and he shook his head.

"I don't know," he said, but his smile remained. If he had to guess, he'd say Cloud was happy.

Even though Cloud had heard the professor tell Tseng he wasn't supposed to be out of his sight, and he'd heard Tseng agree to it, the man still left him alone in one of the training rooms with Kunsel. The room was filled with various fitness equipment. It was many times larger than the small room he'd had to exercise in at the facility in Gongaga.

"How's it going?" Kunsel asked Cloud after watching him looking around the room a long few moments. Finally, Cloud's eyes came back to him and he gave a small polite smile.

"Fine, sir," Cloud answered him and he couldn't stop himself from rolling his eyes a little and shaking his head. He still couldn't believe he had agreed to mentor him in what felt like something of a farce.

"Yeah, that 'sir' crap's not happening," he told Cloud. "I'm going to give you a quick tour and I'll get you set up with an ID badge so you can access this floor and the one above. It's where we'll be working together to get you battle ready, figuratively speaking of course."

"Together?" Cloud echoed and Kunsel let out a long exhale

"Do you know why you're here with me?" he asked him.

"Not exactly, sir," Cloud replied.

"I'm mentoring you," he said but the word didn't seem to register with Cloud as something he could recognize. "You know, I'm going to help you learn how to do SOLDIER things—or try at least. I've never actually done this so…"

He observed Cloud as he nodded, perhaps with understanding, or maybe just because he didn't know what else to do. This was so much harder than he imagined it was going to be and he'd definitely been expecting it to be difficult. As he had grown silent, he watched as Cloud looked away from him and returned to the visual survey he'd been taking of the room initially.

"Cloud," he said and Cloud looked at him in question. "If this is all some act, some kind of defence thing…" he started to say. "Is it?" he asked and it took a few seconds of dead air between them before Cloud seemed to realized he was asking a question.

"Is what?" he asked back then.

Kunsel gestured to him. "This," he said and although he knew he wasn't supposed to bring it up, he'd promised Tseng he wouldn't, once he'd started to voice his thoughts, he couldn't reel them back in. "You. It's just, I'm having a hard time," he explained. His tone was almost accusatory. He wasn't really angry at Cloud but he was angry about what had happened and also frustrated. He didn't want to believe what he'd been told about Cloud, even if he'd already been confronted with it during the holiday events at Shinra. "I don't understand how you can just be different. How you can remember everything and just not care at all. You know this isn't really you, right? Your brain's been messed with."

He shouldn't have said that, but to hell with what he was supposed to say or do. Tseng had basically forced him into the position he was in so his current view was that he could say what he wanted and if it wasn't accepted then they could put Cloud with a different mentor for their demented game they were wholly dedicated to playing.

Cloud listened to him quietly. He looked to his right where there was a small table that held the sign-in sheets where people could reserve certain equipment for specific blocks of time and he touched the edge of the table lightly.

"I know," he said in return after a moment. It wasn't what Kunsel had expected.

"You know what?" he asked fast.

"That there's something inside my head," Cloud told him. He shrugged then. "I'm me, I don't know," he concluded. It was probably the second most unsatisfying answer Kunsel could think of outside of just silence. "Who am I?" he asked suddenly and Kunsel just stared back at him, not knowing how he should answer that, or if he should answer that. Actually, he knew he shouldn't answer but he was curious what the result would be if he did.

"Forget it," he said to him after thinking about it and deciding he truthfully didn't know how to describe Cloud to…Cloud. He didn't think he could really put it into words and doubted he'd understand what he was talking about anyway, so he gave up and decided to do the job Tseng had asked him to do.

It didn't take long for him to get accustomed to new Cloud, finding that in fact as the weeks went by he was second-guessing his first assessments of him. The more time he spent with him, the more he felt like he could see a few little bits of old Cloud, or at least what he'd known of him. He hadn't spent a lot of time with him in the past. There'd only been a handful of times he could recall. There was a determination and attention to detail that seemed familiar. A quiet, contemplative nature that seemed very familiar…but certainly there were things that were missing and their absence became more noticeable over time as Cloud continued to mature into his new altered state of being.

He'd once misjudged Cloud when he was young, accusing him of using Zack for personal or professional gains with he was just kid in the Academy. He couldn't have been more wrong then and once he'd actually taken the time to pay attention, he was able to recognize that Cloud could be defined by his kindness, his compassion and a powerful inner strength. There'd been an innocence in him, in his eyes, like some constant little spark of light that he'd held onto even through everything he'd gone through with Zack at the hands of Hojo and his team of people. The inability Cloud had to connect emotionally to his memories and with people on a meaningful level was noticeable, of course, but it was the loss of that spark over the weeks he was residing back in Midgar that was most notable to Kunsel. He'd watched it happen and had no clue what had made it happen, if it was related to the brain implant or something else…He just didn't know…and there was no one he could talk to about it either, or no one he cared to. He wished he could talk to Zack about it but knew it would only hurt him.

"How's he doing?" Tseng asked him when he'd gone to his office to update him on Cloud's progress. He was nearly eight weeks into the training regimen with Cloud. It had gone quickly and had been as rewarding as it was agonizing. He tried to treasure the time he did get to spend with Cloud, for Zack's sake, but he could never really stop feeling guilty…

"How do you think? He's a machine," he answered the Turk as he passed him a folder of his performance reports for Cloud. "Not even sure I mean that figuratively," he added. "There's not a lot left I can show him before he gets out in the field."

Tseng nodded in return. "Concerns?" he inquired and Kunsel sighed.

"Control? I guess," he said. "He doesn't know his strength, and he's defensive. Competitive almost."

"Well he was competitive at the Academy, his records say," Tseng pointed out.

"I dunno it's different," Kunsel argued. "Goddamn," he cursed.

"What is it?" the man asked.

"I keep waiting for him to snap out of it, you know?" he said and Tseng nodded.

"He's not going to," the man said what they both knew.

"Right," Kunsel agreed. "Anyway, he needs a sparring partner I don't have to worry about him injuring. I'd put him with someone more advanced, but I'm not sure that exists," he explained.

"He's that good?" Tseng questioned.

"He's getting there," Kunsel agreed. "He's had a lot of past practice, that's pretty clear. I can think of some partners that would be technically better but like I said, he's having a hard time controlling his strength. He's broken a lot of equipment, by the way. Pretty sure a few times it was on purpose. If I didn't know any better I'd say he was angry, but that's not possible right?"

"No, it is," Tseng replied. "He's not entirely incapable of emotion, just remembering it. Something like that," he reminded Kunsel. "He can spar with Genesis. Let me know when you want him and I'll arrange it," he said then and Kunsel scoffed.

"Why is he here?" he asked.

"Genesis?" Tseng said and Kunsel nodded.

"He defected. He—"

"I know," Tseng cut him off gently. "He made a deal with Hojo. The professor was able to save his life and he is supposedly now loyal to him and the company once more. His actions over the months he was in Gongaga and since he's been in Midgar indicate that to be true. He also seems to hold some sort of fidelity to Cloud so I'm sure he's going to be happy to act as a sparring partner and spend some more time with him."

"Is he going to be re-entering the ranks of SOLDIER?" Kunsel dared to ask.

"That…is unlikely," Tseng said, though he clearly had to think about it. "I believe he's given himself up to Hojo for continued research and improvement."

Tseng's office phone began ringing then and he looked down at the incoming number to see who it was. He frowned at seeing it and shook his head. It looked as though he were going to ignore it.

"You're not going to answer that?" Kunsel asked him and he shook his head again. When the phone stopped ringing, he explained.

"It's someone from the press. I've redirected them to media relations twice already. Looks like I'm going to be getting a new number," he remarked.

"Something going on?" Kunsel asked him and he sighed.

"Something, yes, I suppose so. People should be hearing about it any time now," Tseng told him. He figured he might as well tell Kunsel now since it truly could be any minute that news was going to break publicly. "Shinra has just recently finalized a deal with a major transcontinental development and mining company. That company has plans to go after untapped mineral resources in some more remote areas, some of which are supposed to be protected plant and wildlife areas. They have agreed to trade minerals for mako energy and to provide an avenue which Shinra can use to place reactors in some of the larger remote towns, gaining us more customers."

"When the hell did that happen?" Kunsel asked.

"Over the holidays when no one was looking," Tseng replied. "But they're looking now, and it's going to be our next public relations nightmare."

"Why doesn't SOLDIER know about this yet? There's obviously going to be threats coming the company's way," Kunsel said.

"There always is," Tseng pointed out. "I'm sure you'll be receiving the notice of heightened alert soon," he said and his phone started ringing once more. "I better deal with this," he spoke with some irritation. "Thank you for the update on Cloud," he said by way of goodbye.

"No problem," Kunsel said as he got up to leave. "Oh!" he spoke then as he reached the door. He turned back and Tseng had just picked up the handset of his phone.

"This is Tseng, one moment, please," the man spoke into it before lowering it.

"I nearly forgot," Kunsel said, "He wants to talk to you about something."

"Cloud?" Tseng inquired and Kunsel nodded.

"Yeah, he wouldn't tell me what it was about, so I dunno. I told him you're pretty busy, but you'd possibly be able to come by tomorrow in the morning. Do you mind?"

"Not at all. I'll see him then," Tseng assured him and Kunsel thanked him before leaving the office.

000

As busy as he'd been, Tseng had been so curious wondering what Cloud wanted to talk to him about that he had been tempted to try and come up with a way to see him alone as soon as possible. Unfortunately, it did need to wait until the following morning when there was a little less going on. He met up with Cloud while he was exercising and had followed him to one of the changing rooms where he'd retrieved something from his belongings in a locker. It was a folded document that he'd hidden away in a pocket of his clothing. Cloud unfolded it before handing it to him. He was surprised to see what it was.

"Where did you get this?" he asked.

"I took it from Rand," Cloud told him, surprising Tseng for a few reasons. He was a little surprised Rand had left the document somewhere Cloud could come across it and also that Cloud had taken it and now had the motivation to question it.

"You stole it?" he questioned, though the answer was clear.

"Yes," Cloud confirmed.

"Why?" was Tseng's following inquiry.

"I want to know what it means. He wouldn't tell me," he explained. "It's about me, right?" he asked and Tseng shifted his eyes from him back to the document in his hands.

"It appears to be," he said in return. "What do you want to know?" he asked, prepared to explain it, but he knew it wouldn't be easy.

Cloud moved closer to him and standing shoulder to shoulder with him he pointed to one of the first words on the page. Product. There were other words to mean the same thing in the document. Asset, property… "What does this mean?"

"Well," Tseng began, looking up at Cloud again briefly and trying to decide how best to explain. "This is a shareholder's document," he began to explain. "So sometimes when you have a product or a company, in order to manage costs, an owner can offer up portions or parts to other people or companies who can be called shareholders or investors. Together they share the expenses."

"Parts?" Cloud echoed in question

"Percentages," Tseng tried to clarify. What the document was detailing was the breakdown of those individuals and company's who currently owned shares of Cloud as an asset.

"So, the product is me, and percentages of me are owned by people or companies?" Cloud asked him and he was hesitant to agree. He nodded finally. There wasn't much of a reaction from Cloud at first. He just asked, "Who owns the biggest percentage?"

Tseng looked down the document at the breakdown. "Shinra. Fifty-five percent," he told him with some surprise of his own. It was less than he would have assumed. "Ideally it would be better if they had more but having more than fifty percent means they can still maintain control and make decisions without consultation with investors, unless something different is written into the agreement." He lowered the document as he looked at Cloud once more. "Do you understand?"

Cloud took the document back from him slowly. "I didn't know, or…I forgot…" he said quietly.

Tseng watched him staring at the piece of paper. He cleared his throat then. "Forget what is on this," he ordered as he pulled it from his grasp and folded it back up. "It's not what you are," he tried to tell him, but he could see that the new knowledge he'd gained had affected him. The only thing he could think of to say then was something that might distract him. "Kunsel says you've been doing really well with your training," he said and Cloud gave him something of a small shrug. "That's good, isn't it?" he asked as he tried to get Cloud to look at him again.

"Yes, sir," he agreed finally and did look at him, but his mind was obviously still focused on the issue he'd brought forward. He motioned to take the folded document from Tseng and placed it back with his belongings in the locker. "Thank you for explaining things to me, sir," he said. His voice was level, calm, unemotional. Gone were those days when Cloud would smile bashfully at anything complimentary. He seemed much more stoic now.

"Of course," Tseng replied. "Is there anything else you need or want to talk about?" he asked him and for a moment it did seem like he was giving it some thought. That perhaps there was something but then he shook his head and told him no. Tseng tried to give him a reassuring smile. "Don't worry about that document," he reiterated. "Just focus on training," he advised and Cloud nodded.

"Yes, sir," he agreed.

He didn't like the thought of leaving Cloud alone but he had no other choice. He had his hands full with his own work. He gave one final instruction before leaving him. "Make sure you return that document to where you found it."

Cloud had told Tseng he would do that, that he would put it back where he found it but that night when he was back in the apartment, the folder where he'd found it in the nightstand next to Rand's side of the bed was gone. He didn't know what to do with it then and he'd been distracted by the rattling sound of a rolling pill bottle in the drawer. He knew the difference between the pills Rand would often take himself and the ones the man had given him on multiple occasions. The ones meant to relax him. The rolling bottle contained the pills that Rand had given him those times. Every time he'd been given one of those pills the same thing had followed…

He had a moment then as he sat on his own and Rand was out of the room on a phone call, that thoughts were suddenly entering his mind. He suddenly found himself questioning his reality. What was going on? He was either a next-level SOLDIER recruit or he was a product. An asset divided into parts owned by different people. Was he both? Something could be one thing and be something else after all. What was he to Rand, really?

His thoughts were brief and uncomfortable and brought on a quick headache that seemed to stop his attempts to dig back into his memories for something to help him figure out what was going on. The sudden sharp pain had him holding his head in his hands and rocking himself slowly where he sat, squeezing his eyes shut and waiting for the pain to dull. He didn't hear when Rand came into the room. He felt his arms being touched and he forced his eyes open again when he felt his hands being pulled downward. Rand was in front of him and took hold of his head in his own hands.

"What's going on?" the man asked him as he was leaning down, still holding onto him. Cloud looked up at him but didn't say anything. The drawer was still open in the side table and the document he'd been trying to return was lying on the tabletop. Rand noticed it then and released Cloud's head to pick it up. He looked at it briefly to see what it was and when he realized he released a heavy exhale. "You took this?" he asked, and Cloud just nodded in confirmation. "Why?" was his next question. "I told you it isn't your concern," he spoke in annoyance.

"It's about me," Cloud said then. "Is that what I am to you?" he asked.

Rand looked down at the document again, scanning the beginning section before meeting Cloud's eyes. "No," he replied. "Of course not," he added, letting the document fall into the open drawer that he then closed before sitting himself next to Cloud on the bed. "You mean so much more to me—" he began to explain.

"What am I then?" Cloud asked him before he could go on. He had turned his head to look his way.

Rand took a deep breath. "It's not a secret being kept from you. You've known this before. You're an asset and an agent of Shinra. You do belong to the company." He could see Cloud sinking a little under his words. "So do all SOLDIERs," he told him then and Cloud's eyes seemed to refocus on his again. "So do the Shinra military soldiers." He knew his words had the effect he wanted. Cloud appeared to accept them and he nodded a little. "But that's not what you are to me," he told Cloud then. "I wish I could say all the things I feel in a way you would understand…or relate to," he spoke softly. "I don't want to think about a future if you aren't in it," he concluded.

Cloud looked back at him but didn't say anything. He just seemed sad. It was hard to see past that or to ignore it. Since Cloud had started his SOLDIER training nearly eight weeks prior, he'd been developing well physically and mentally. He had transitioned fully into the intermediate stage of post-implant recovery and for the most part he had handled it well. The training came at an opportune time because he was able to do something with the sudden combative and challenging energy he had. After turning down the chance to see Tifa Lockhart, he hadn't asked again to see her or anyone else from his past. He'd really seemed to settle into a routine and things had gone well, Rand had thought. It had been difficult at first to accept being separated from Cloud for most of the daytime hours but he'd had no choice. He hadn't been happy to learn who it was who was mentoring Cloud, but again, he'd had no choice. He'd been assured Kunsel was the best possible option and to his surprise, nothing adverse had occurred so far as a result of the decision. In fact, for awhile Cloud had seemed the closest to happy that he'd seen him. He seemed content.

Things between them at home had been progressing as well, he thought. He'd had a television brought into the apartment so that they would have something to do in the evenings other than read. Their physical and sexual relationship had continued, with Cloud actually initiating some of the contact, but things had changed fairly recently when he'd started noticing that sadness in Cloud. Perhaps it wasn't actually sadness. It was hard to know what it was but until he knew, his conscience wouldn't let him act on his urges. Unless Cloud made a move first, he didn't try to coerce him into something sexual. He had begun to wonder if he was going to need to talk to Hojo about reinstating drug treatment for Cloud's mental state. Now that he had the implant, ECT wouldn't be an option if somehow he ended up slipping back into deep psychological decline.

He placed a hand on the back of Cloud's head as he looked at him on the bed. "How bad does your head hurt?" he asked. "Do you need something for it?" he questioned and Cloud shook his head.

"The pain's fading," he said.

000

The next day, Cloud didn't wake up thinking about the document he'd shown Tseng. He wasn't really thinking of anything. After the lab he went up to where he was supposed to meet with Kunsel in a sparring room. Kunsel appeared briefly and told him to warm up for a little while without him because he had to go handle something first. The room was empty except for matting on the floor and running halfway up the walls. There was a line of windows on one side of the room and a door that led out to a balcony outside shared with other rooms at that side of the building. Cloud was mid warm-up when he heard a sudden knocking on the glass door to the balcony outside. Turning around fast, he could see a person standing on the balcony and he recognized him. It was Lazard. He looked around before approaching the door and opening it.

"Where did you come from?" he asked the man as he held the door open. Lazard didn't look well. His whole body almost seemed gray somehow, dusted in ash. "Are you okay, brother?" he questioned next.

"I'm fine as can be. I need your help," Lazard told him.

"My help?" Cloud echoed.

"Please retrieve me a training uniform and come back here," the man directed and all he did was nod before leaving him to do what he asked.

When he returned from the changing room with a fresh uniform he gave it to Lazard who put it on over his clothes.

"How did you get up here from the street?" he asked the man.

"Never mind that," Lazard replied gently. "There's something I need you to do for me," he explained.

"What is it?" he asked in return.

"There's a room I need you to get me into. It will have an electronic lock," Lazard said.

"What's in the room?" Cloud spoke curiously and Lazard shook his head.

"Nothing you need to worry about," the man told him before making a move to leave the sparring room. When they were in the hall he headed for the closest stairwell.

"Which floor are we going to?" Cloud asked him when they'd entered the stairwell. He found it a little strange Lazard didn't want to take the elevator in his current condition.

"Sixty-Seven," the man said as he began what looked like a difficult climb up the stairs.

"You want to see Hojo?" Cloud asked him and he spoke a breathless no in return and asked why he would ask that. "That's where his lab is," Cloud told him.

"Right," the man said in return. "Forgot that," he said.

His words confused Cloud a little. Had he been there before?

The room that they arrived at, which Lazard wanted access to wasn't Hojo's lab and it wasn't a room Cloud had ever been in. There were only numbers and a letter on a plaque on the door, nothing else to indicate what was inside. Lazard waited for him to unlock the door. It didn't take any effort for him to do so. He was about to follow the man in when Lazard put a hand out to stop him.

"Just go back downstairs," the man ordered before pausing to look at him. "You shouldn't trust them, Cloud," he spoke firmly.

"Who?" Cloud asked.

The man delivered a verbal blow then. "Any of them. Hojo, Rand, Genesis, any of them. None of them care about you and they're going to destroy you. If I don't see you again, I hope that you can have peace."

With that, he disappeared into the room with the door locking behind him. It took a long moment, but Cloud decided to follow after him, to see what he was doing but once he'd entered the first locked door, he was confronted with a second one locked manually from the inside. With nothing else to do in there, he left and headed back into the hall.

Nothing about what Lazard said made any sense to him but the man had known where he wanted to go and clearly had a reason to go there…As the minutes passed and Cloud was headed back to the sparring room, he started to get a bad feeling. His stomach told him something didn't seem right and it had him abandoning the training floor to go to where Rand's office was. When he stepped out of the elevator he actually ran into the man as he was coming out of a restroom. He called to him to get him to turn around.

"What is it?" Rand asked when he found Cloud coming toward him quickly. "Is something wrong?" he asked, noting the look of urgency he had on his face. It was more than that though. He looked worried.

"I think I did something wrong," Cloud told him.

"What are you talking about?" he asked. He'd only just seen Cloud less than an hour prior and couldn't imagine what he could have done in that amount of time.

"I let someone inside," Cloud said and he shook his head, not understanding.

"Inside what?"

"I was waiting for Kunsel. He was outside on the balcony. He said he needed my help. He told me to open a door for him and I did. I went in after him but there was another door. I couldn't get through it," Cloud explained to him in something of a frantic tone. Things weren't much clearer. Surely, he didn't mean what it sounded.

"Who was outside?" he inquired. Not Kunsel, he assumed.

"Cloud!" a voice called from nearby and they both looked to where Kunsel had exited the elevators and was coming toward them. "What's going on?" he asked as he approached them quickly. "Why'd you leave?"

"It was Lazard," Cloud finally answered Rand and it was within earshot of Kunsel by then.

"Who?" Rand questioned.

"Lazard Deusericus?" Kunsel spoke up before Cloud could reply. "The former Executive Director for SOLDIER," he clarified for Cloud. "Why are you asking about him?" he asked Cloud and Rand spoke for him.

"He wasn't asking about him, I was," he said.

"What do you care about—" Kunsel started to snap back at Rand but Cloud interjected.

"I let him in," he said and Kunsel looked back at him in surprise. He knew what the man had been up to since no longer working for the company and the last he'd heard from Zack about it, he'd disappeared in Gongaga.

"In…to the building?" Kunsel asked Cloud and he nodded.

"Which room did he want into?" Rand questioned him next.

"Sixty-seven dash twenty-four dee," he said.

"In the Science Department?" Kunsel said with surprise. "That's a research lab. We need security," he spoke to Rand then as he searched out his phone in his pocket. "You better let the professor know," he added before turning to head back to the elevators. Rand followed after him along with Cloud. "You sure it was Lazard?" Kunsel asked Cloud as he was on the phone, waiting for security to answer. All Cloud could do was nod before Kunsel was speaking with someone from security, telling them they had a breach and to secure the building exits. Rand had also reached Hojo at that point and was alerting him to what was going on.

Hojo must have been somewhere on the floor, either in his lab or elsewhere nearby because he was already at the room when they'd made it there. Cloud followed Kunsel and Rand in and looked around for any sign Lazard was still there but it appeared he'd gone. Hojo was furious and panicked. Galen and another of the lab assistants were with him at some kind of unit. A viscous fluid was seeping out from somewhere on the unit and puddling on the floor around it. Hojo walked through it repeatedly as he paced back and forth. Galen was at a control panel next to the unit while the other assistant looked to be trying to use thick black tape to patch it where it was leaking. Hojo was screaming at them and at whoever was on the phone with him now, someone other than Rand.

"Professor!" Kunsel called to the man to get his attention and Hojo whipped around to face him.

"Have you caught him?!" Hojo asked. "You must have seen him on the way here!" he shouted.

"You saw him?" Kunsel questioned.

"Yes! He knocked me down on the way out!" the man spoke angrily. Kunsel had to stop himself from smiling at the thought.

Too bad he didn't murder you on the way out, he thought to himself. He decided there was nothing he could do in the room and needed to go see if he could track down Lazard. "Stay with Rand," he told Cloud as he was heading by him.

Hojo was back to yelling at his assistants. Just barely discernable beneath the sound was that of a warning alarm. It was low and less severe sounding than Hojo's voice. The sound of the alarm finally cut out but Galen had to shout at the professor to be quiet for them to be sure. Whatever Galen had been trying to do at the control panel he must have accomplished.

"The power's stabilizing," Galen told Hojo. "But it's not going to last if we can't stop the leak in the unit."

"What is the damage?" Hojo inquired quickly. "How much tissue death?"

"We can't know that yet," Galen pointed out. "There's still vitals," he said. "That's all we know. It needs to be moved into a different unit."

"Is everything under control, Professor?" Rand spoke up then and the man looked their way.

"What a stupid question," Hojo replied. His eyes landed on Cloud then. "This was your doing, was it?" he spoke angrily.

"No, that's not—" Rand began to argue and Hojo interrupted sharply.

"It's what you said a minute ago on the phone. 'Cloud is saying he let someone into a room on your floor,' that's what you said." Hojo looked back at the unit where Galen and the other assistant were. "Well that someone, and I'm certain I know who, attempted to destroy the containment unit that holds Jenova! Attempted to destroy her remains!" he announced. The surprise of hearing that made Cloud feel suddenly weak.

"That's Jenova?" he asked, barely able to find his voice.

"Whatever's left of her," Hojo confirmed. Cloud began to walk toward him, toward the place where Jenova supposedly lay but Rand stopped him, holding his one arm tightly.

"I'm sorry, Professor. I didn't know," Cloud told him.

"And that excuses you?!" Hojo fired back at him in fury. "You let him into the building, onto this floor and into this room! What did you think he was here for?!"

"It was a mistake," Rand defended. "He realized the error and came to find me," he said.

"Oh, yes, that indeed is another thing I must wonder about," Hojo said in return. "Why the hell would he leave this floor to go all the way to find you when he could have come just down the hall to where I was to inform me?!"

"I'm sorry," Cloud said again. "I'm sorry, Professor."

When Rand looked at him he was sure Cloud was actually sorry. He seemed horrified to be confronted with what had happened, what his actions had led to. Tears were welling up in his eyes and were a few blinks ready to spill out.

"You're going to be, that I'm sure of," Hojo spoke coldly. "For now you can explain your real motivations for letting that traitor back into this building," he stated firmly.

"Real motivations?" Rand said. "It was an accident," he declared.

"Take him to the lab," Hojo ordered him then and Rand was quick to shake his head.

"I'm not going to do that," he said back and it had Hojo approaching him fast.

"You're walking a dangerous line," he warned. Speaking of Cloud then he said, "He's going to know this was unacceptable."

"Not the way you want him to," Rand concluded, taking charge with the final word. With Cloud's arm still in his hand, he turned him back toward the door and headed away from the professor.

He brought Cloud back to the apartment and left him there to go deal with Hojo. He knew the man was going to be furious with him now that he'd challenged him the way he had and he needed to do damage control. He'd acted out of emotion. This wasn't the Gongaga facility and he wasn't going to stand aside and let the man take out his anger on Cloud in the form of some sadistic punishment. They were in Midgar now and Cloud wasn't just Hojo's specimen. He was a member of SOLDIER now and Cloud meant something to him personally. Things were different than they had been and he wasn't comfortable with or willing to let someone inflict pain on him out of anger. Cloud had made a mistake. That was all. And he'd tried to fix it. Still, he knew the professor could put his position in jeopardy if he wanted to so he didn't want to piss him off too much.

There was a lot of talking down that needed to be done and a lot of discussion about how they would ensure nothing like this would happen again. Rand took ownership over what Cloud had done, saying it was his oversight not having explained to Cloud the importance of security and keeping the building safe from intruders. Eventually, Hojo gave in and seemed to abandon his belief that the only way Cloud would learn from this incident was through punishment. He'd been so consumed over thinking Hojo was the only threat. He just never thought about the other possibilities…

When he returned to the apartment in the afternoon, it was a little dark. It was heavily raining outside making it darker than it normally would be at that time of day. So, he didn't immediately notice anything of concern when he entered. Cloud wasn't in the living room area or the kitchen and he didn't know why but immediately an uneasy feeling struck his gut. He made himself really look around then and that's when he realized something was wrong. Although he could already see it, he still reached to turn on the light next to him on the wall and with the illumination came a sudden and hard sinking feeling as he confirmed for himself he'd seen blood, and more than a few drops of it.

He could see spots of it on the tile floor and on the counter top. In the sink is where he found much more. It looked as though someone had stood by the sink as they were bleeding out. He called out for Cloud then and moved out of the kitchen, following a trail of blood drops toward the bedroom. When he entered he could see the bathroom door was open just enough to see a stream of light cast over the floor. He called Cloud's name again but didn't get a response. He crossed the room quickly and burst through the bathroom door, searching out Cloud with his eyes immediately. He found him on the floor of the shower, sitting fully clothed on the floor with dribbles and smears of blood on the floor around him. There was a six-inch kitchen knife in his right hand. He was holding the handle in a loose grip and had the tip of the blade pressing into the grout line between two tiles in the floor. He was twisting the knife back and forth slowly, digging into the grout. Rand looked him over trying to see where he was cut but he could see no injury. Wherever he'd inflicted a cut, whether one or more, must have healed already. He couldn't help exhaling with relief, thanking Seraph for that gift.

"Cloud, what are you doing? What did you do?" he asked. Cloud didn't answer or even look at him. "Let go of the knife," he ordered and Cloud didn't immediately act. "Please," he said, his tone firm but pleading. It was another moment before Cloud gave in and let the blade fall from his hand. Rand stepped into the large shower then and leaned down to pick the knife up. He placed it in the sink before turning his attention back to Cloud.

"You were cutting yourself?" He asked and Cloud nodded without looking at him. "Why? Why would you do that?" he questioned in a more frantic sounding tone than he'd intended.

"Jenova," he said. It was all he said.

"That wasn't your fault," he tried to tell Cloud again and that's when Cloud finally looked at him.

"I did something wrong," he said firmly, no hint of a question in his voice.

"So you cut yourself as self-punishment?" He fired back at Cloud and waited for his response but he was silent again. Releasing a huffed exhale, he reached to take Cloud's right arm to help him stand. "You need to get cleaned up," he told him. Although the cuts he had made were no longer open, the blood was still on him and around him. Cloud pulled back from him then, drawing his knees to his chest and hugging them with his arms. Crouching in front of him, Rand tried to talk him through whatever he was currently feeling.

"Yes, okay, it was wrong what you did," he conceded. "You shouldn't have let the man into the building. You're right. But you made a mistake," he said. As Cloud avoided making eye-contact with him he went on. "You do not need physical punishment because of a mistake," he concluded firmly.

"Hojo's angry," Cloud uttered in a quiet tone.

"He was," Rand agreed. "But it's fine now. He knows you didn't mean for what happened to happen," he told him. "You didn't, right?" he asked then and Cloud looked upward at him.

"I didn't," he confirmed. Whether he meant for it to happen or not, Jenova had been hurt by something he did. He wondered what she was going to think of him now.

After another long moment Cloud gave in and stood up, ready to clean up the mess he'd made.

000

It must have been quite a downpour going on up on the plate, Zack noted as he was on his way to Johnny's place. Waterfalls of dirty water were pouring into the slums from above wherever there was an opening. There was a water collection system that was supposed to stop that from happening but every once in awhile a particularly heavy rain would overwhelm the system and rainwater on the streets would overflow and inevitably head downward. Wise people knew to avoid the falling water that would likely be contaminated by whatever it had picked up on the roads and streets above before making a trip down to them.

The air temperature up on the plate was warmer than below, especially at that time of the year. As it was nearing spring, there were some longer days of sunlight that would help heat things up topside but below the cooler air was more easily trapped. Zack found he could still see his breath as he was walking the few blocks to Johnny's.

He entered without bothering to knock and was greeted first by Reno sitting on one of two old brown couches in the main living area where he was watching whatever was on television. It looked to be a commercial airing right then. He thought he could hear Johnny's voice coming from his bedroom where it sounded like he was talking to someone, probably on the phone.

"I thought you were seeing Kunsel the Great tonight," Reno remarked as Zack took off his coat and hung it on an empty hook near the door.

"So did I," Zack replied. "He cancelled on me. Said he had work to deal with."

He'd seen Kunsel a handful of times since Cloud had been brought back to Midgar, whenever Kunsel had the time. Being able to see him had been the thing he needed to keep him calm enough to not go crazy and do something he'd regret, like attempting to storm Shinra HQ on his own. It had been weeks and no one outside of Shinra had seen Cloud in the flesh since the New Years party. It had been a shock when Randon Cane had called Tifa after the party and set up a time for her to visit with Cloud. It seemed too good to be true and apparently it was because mere hours after the appointment was set up, it was being cancelled again with Rand saying something about not being able to obtain necessary clearances for her or anyone not affiliated with the company at present time.

Zack hadn't allowed himself to get his hopes up over the situation so when word came that the appointment wouldn't be happening, he didn't feel much different than he already had. He could tell Tifa was crushed by it though. Thankfully, it was not long after that Kunsel had come to visit and had been able to give them an update on Cloud, telling them that he was going to be seeing him on a near daily basis for SOLDIER training and that he'd be mentoring him. That had been difficult for Zack initially to hear. He was grateful of course, knowing Cloud would be around someone he could trust, but he was also struck by jealousy and disappointment thinking that once upon a time that could have been him in Kunsel's place, mentoring Cloud when he'd finally made it into SOLDIER after his contract ended with the military. Despite his feelings, he was thankful for those times when he was able to meet up with Kunsel to hear about Cloud's progress and also just to hang out and talk about the normal things in life that at least helped distract him for a short time.

As he sat himself down on the unoccupied couch in the room, he looked at the six or seven empty beer bottles on the old wooden coffee table near Reno.

"Staying in tonight?" he asked and Reno nodded.

"The weather's too shitty for shakedowns," he commented and Zack didn't bother to ask what he meant.

He didn't know exactly what Reno did working for Johnny but not a lot of what Six was involved in seemed entirely legal so he could use his imagination and that was good enough for him. He heard the sound of the nearby bedroom door opening then and Johnny finally appeared. He nodded Zack's way when he saw him.

"Change of plans tonight?" he asked.

"Yeah," Zack confirmed. Johnny was in the kitchen for a few moments and returned with a cold beer from the fridge that he offered to Zack. He took it, thanking him.

"Let me ask you this," Reno said then. "How suicidal do you think the president actually is? I mean that seriously."

Zack shook his head at the question. "I dunno, why?"

"Have you heard about this yet?" Reno asked, pointing at the television with his own beer bottle in his hand.

Zack looked at what was airing on the screen and it looked to be a news station. Reno turned up the volume a little louder. The anchor was talking about Shinra's decision to do business with Hark Incorporated, a company known for its controversial land planning and development strategies. More specifically, they'd been known for forcefully displacing human and animal populations, as well as contributing to pollution of the groundwater wherever they were working. From what Zack knew about the company they actually didn't seem so different from Shinra, they just seemed to care less about hiding what they were doing from the public. They also owned a mining monopoly and Shinra could sure use that to their benefit when it came to needing building materials for more mako reactors.

"Yeah, read about it in the paper," Zack confirmed. He'd made the connection when he'd read about it that Hark Inc. must have been the company Rufus had managed to get a deal with for his father, thus getting him his inheritance back as well as his role as company head should something happen to the president.

"Protests are already happening south of Midgar," Reno stated. "People are freaking the fuck out and yet they're still planning to have their Shinra Spring Parade and Festival with the president riding a float and leaving his big fat head out in the open for all to target."

Zack couldn't help but laugh a little at Reno's remark. He took a gulp of beer before giving Reno his thoughts. "Nothing's going to happen. You know they sweep all the buildings on the parade route ahead of time. SOLDIERs are marching so that paired with the local police and Turks all over the place, there's no way anything could actually be pulled off by someone stupid enough to try something."

"Well, this year stupid's got a name," Reno said with a smirk as he looked from Zack over to where Johnny was drying some dishes in the kitchen.

Zack turned to look over the back of the couch at him. He rested his left arm on it and asked, "Are you serious?" Johnny turned around where he was standing at the sink a plate in one hand and a dish towel in the other. He didn't say anything but looked at Zack, waiting for him to go on, as he knew he would. "That's where you want to do the hit?" Zack inquired in shock.

"That's where the client wants it done," Johnny replied simply, continuing with his dish drying. The client being Rufus.

"You'll get caught before you even make it to a spot you can get a good shot at the guy," Zack told him.

"No, I won't," Johnny argued.

"There's going to be kids there," was Zack's next point.

"I'm not going to shoot any of them," Johnny told him.

That wasn't really what Zack was thinking. "Aren't you worried about what they're going to witness?"

Johnny scoffed at that. "In this city?" he fired back.

Zack realized his question was pretty silly. There was a lot to witness in Midgar, no doubt about that.

"There's going to be a foolproof plan, don't worry about it," Johnny told him before turning around again to put his attention back on the dishes.

Zack didn't know what to say then. He looked at Reno who just shrugged. "Guess we'll find out soon how committed Rufus is to getting rid of Hojo and helping Strife out." They both took a drink from their beer bottles at the same time. Reno tilted his head back and forth then and smiled. "That or Six is gonna get arrested and face a possible death sentence for trying to assassinate the president. Should be a hell of a parade."