A/N: Right guys, not gonna lie to you. I'm struggling with the next few chapters but because of that, I may not be able to update next Wednesday. You can bet I'm gonna try, but I'll be leaving updates on the matter in my bio if I run into any issues. I've been doing a lot of plotline threading throughout the entire story, and it's really vital that they come in the right order, that's why it's all so time-consuming. Hopefully, you'll think the outcome is worth any wait though!

And OH YEAH THIS CHAPTER IS A GOOD ONE. Love this. Do I say that every chapter? Possibly. But seriously! Dudes this one holds up if you don't mind a little cliffhanger… I'll say no more.

Have yourselves a fantastic week (or possibly two)!

24th Jul '19

Chapter 19: The Burden of Truth

The infirmary. Again.

But not as a patient, at least. Or perhaps that was worse. Maybe she would have preferred to be the patient than the visitor.

The room was not unlike hers from a week ago; white on white that only served to make their injuries appear worse. An IV connected to what Aster was told contained a concentrated mixture of more than just saline and painkillers, but Mako too. Zack's SOLDIER enhancements rendered him able to receive more intensive treatments without the ill-effects of Mako-poisoning that ordinary people might experience. Aster glanced at her fingers, where her old wounds had withdrawn to naught but a thin pink hint.

Regardless, she perched on the lip of the hospital bed near its injured inhabitant, carefully peeling coated bandages apart from their sealant for the doctor at Zack's side. The very same doctor who had seen her. There was no flash of recognition. After all, why would he have ever treated a civilian?

He inspected a clipboard. "Three fractured ribs, multiple bruised vertebrae, surface lacerations and a stab wound to the abdomen," he said, then hung the file at the end of the bed. "Not the worst state I've ever seen you in, Fair."

"What can I say?" said Zack, waving his hand dismissively.

The doctor pushed his glasses up his nose. The lenses were a good half a centimetre thick and stuck out of the spindly wire frames. They magnified his watery grey-blue eyes so much he became reminiscent of a bug. He helped his patient sit upright, earning a stifled wince or two from Zack who, by the doctor's best estimations, was trying to save face in front of the girl.

The light sheets slipped from Zack's chest and bundled around his hips, and Aster's cheeks flushed at his state of shirtlessness. With a grin on his lips, he didn't mention it. She focussed instead on the wound, and not the way his abs rippled towards his waistband.

"Ahem, the bandages?" the doctor said for a second time.

"S-sorry, here," she said, hurriedly passing the dressings over. The doctor placed a pad over the stitched stab site. It made Aster shudder, sending a silent prayer that the horn of that enormous beast was not what ran him through. But would it have been any better if the truth lay in the tip of a spear? Or a bullet? Not really. So she didn't ask.

"It will feel cold," the doctor said, securing the pad to Zack's body with a firm wrap of bandages. "It is lined with a Mako gel and infused with the trace of Cure. It will accelerate your natural SOLDIER healing capabilities."

Natural and SOLDIER didn't really seem to belong in the same sentence.

Doctor Bugstache handed Aster the remaining bandages to wind while he filled a few boxes on Zack's chart and removed his IV. "I see no need to sign you off so long as you don't do anything exceedingly strenuous. Expect to feel yourself again in approximately three days."

"Three days?" Aster repeated, forgetting her volume and almost dropping the dressings. "He broke three ribs — and there's a veritable hole in his stomach."

"Yes." The doctor spoke simply but did not condescend. He was probably a great parent or teacher to someone. "When a man is made SOLDIER, his strength, stamina and regenerative powers are completely overhauled. Minor cuts and grazes may even, in some instances, heal before the eyes. Couple this with Shinra's modern healing technology and, well, you have the super soldier."

Aster flicked her eyes to Zack, full of child-like awe. "That's incredible. You're incredible," she said, tying off the bandages and faintly shaking her head. She asked him if they were too tight, he said it was fine.

"You might consider a career in medical assistance," the doctor said with a smiley moustache. "Very helpful."

Aster smoothed over the binding for little more reason than an excuse to keep her hands against Zack's body. "I don't have the patience, I'm afraid."

The doctor nodded and addressed his patient. "Call upon Angeal as usual, shall I?"

Zack groaned but resigned himself to his immediate fate. "Alright, fine. Thanks, man."

Doctor Bugstache gave a stiff nod and bade them farewell, leaving them to their own devices.

The PHS in Aster's pocket began to ring. Zack shifted his legs off the bed, and she stood between his knees with a gentle, if uncertain, hand on his thigh. She reached into her back pocket with the other and silenced the call.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, suddenly aware of her voice becoming the loudest sound in an otherwise humming room.

"I'm alright. Can't we get you checked out?"

"I'm fine, just a bit battered." She shrugged. "I don't have any of that Mako stuff, mind, so you'll have to give me a couple days to look less…vaguely purple." As she said it, she absently poked a bruise on her jaw that was beginning to head.

"I can heal you—"

"—Hey, no. You need to rest," she said, touching his shoulder. Her PHS started to vibrate again. "I don't claim to know much about materia—although you can bet I'm gonna try and find out after all I've seen today—but even I know using materia is exhausting."

"But—"

"—Nothing. If I feel any pain, I promise I'll speak to Tifa, okay? Have you seen that girl's bathroom cabinet? Holy crap. She could give this sick house a run for its money."

She tore open a medicinal wipe from the box of them on the bedside table. A trail of blood from a cut on his forehead dried into his eyebrow. Least she could do was wipe it away. Clean the traces of war left on his face that she could reach. It was a small aid. She couldn't wipe away the memory of the ambush, nor the impact that it had.

She was aware of how he watched her. It was hard to ignore the glow of his eyes, especially when the low sun that glared through the window lit them two shades lighter, like a frosty but bright day. But slowly, his smile fell from his face, snatched by uncertainty.

There was something about how his voice hit the air that said he spoke more to himself than to her. "How can the girl who danced into the small hours of the night possibly be the same girl that destroyed an anti-SOLDIER unit…?"

Aster hesitated. She averted her gaze and pulled her lower lip over her teeth, biting the colour out of them. There was an opportunity to tell the truth here. If only she were brave enough to take it.

She threw the used wipe in the bin and set her fingers on his knees, staring at her feet. "So, I…"

Zack pressed a fresh medicinal wipe to her jaw, and she flinched. Not pain, unawares. And her resolve crumbled from under her feet like sand. The skin of her chest blew red and warm, and that warmth continued to rise to her forehead.

"I was part of a small…supplementary combative force in Icicle Inn."

His cheeks hollowed by the gaping of his jaw. "You're a freaking mercenary?"

"N-no, not exactly—" His eyes were so wide. Was it disbelief? Or was it horror? Disgust? Sweat prickled at her neck—this heat was unbearable. "H-have you heard about the incidents around Icicle Inn?"

The muscles at his jaw tensed when he pinched together his lips. His tone soothed as he carefully wiped away the blood on her mouth and nose. "Yeah…I heard about it."

"You ever been posted there?"

He shook his head. "Not for a while. I knew there were a lot of problems going on, but I didn't know it was so bad that the villagers have to defend themselves. It's," he said, hesitantly, "monster attacks, isn't it? Loads of them."

"Uh-huh," she said because it was the only sound her throat would make. She swallowed down the tightness, taking a moment to discard the used cleansing wipes to distract herself from the tingling behind the bridge of her nose. Again she returned to Zack's knees, and this time he took her hands in his.

"Before I left, five people—no," she said, haunted by the sight of the woman that collapsed in a river of her own blood at the jaw of a Bandersnatch near the ice rink, "six people, townspeople, had died. Two had gone missing."

"Every day you felt just a little bit unsafer," she continued, playing with his fingers, watching them intently. "But it never really stopped the people from living. In order to survive in those climates, you have to have a little bit about you, you know? The people continued their lives in spite of the fear."

Zack's eyes stuck to their hands, too. He didn't speak, allowing her the room to carry on when she felt the strength to do so.

"I had a mentor, I suppose you could say. He took me under his wing a few years prior, so it only made sense to join the band of do-gooders when it formed. I was qualified."

She went on to explain. "Basically, monster-exterminating is an integral part of life in the Knowlespole; it's freezing so we need pelts for coats and meat for food. I was being mentored by Bryan in the first place because our trades are taught by the learned to the younger generation to continue the craft. I'm terrible with a needle and I can't cook to save my life. Figured that if I couldn't be trained to make clothes and food, I'd have to be trained to source the materials instead.

"When the attacks started, it all made sense. I'm already better equipped to fight than say, my younger brother, who granted, did have some training but much less than me, or my little sister or old-ass parents. They sent some troops to aid us but…it isn't enough. People are dying. The single reason why only six people have died is because of how hard we've been working to keep them at bay…!"

Her words fell like lead in dead air. Zack looked at her, at the way she'd narrowed her eyes to stop them stinging. Slowly he wrapped his arms around her waist. "Why did you really come here…? To Midgar?"

She pressed a shaking hand to her forehead. "I didn't have a choice."

He would never have understood how true that statement was. Neither could he have realised why she was fighting back tears, not really. Because the true reason wasn't fear, it was guilt. How it gnawed from inside out. That she was here. One of the most equipped to help. With no way to do so.

The tears didn't fall. Her PHS rang for the thousandth time, and this time she took it out with a sniff. It was the only person it was ever going to be. She shoved it back in her pocket. Wasn't like she could answer it in front of Zack, but it did nibble on her mind as to what the problem could be, and she knew it was time she had to leave before Tseng marched down here and dragged her out himself—that was what his following text message read, anyway.

"You gotta go?" Zack asked quietly as though he read her mind. But honestly, he'd just heard the constant ringing for the past ten or so minutes. Seemed important.

Her lips parted as she nodded. "Yeah. You gonna be okay?"

"Oh, yeah. I practically live here." When her entire body stiffened and her eyes widened, he quickly backtracked. "I mean—not literally! I'll be out in less than half an hour. Just gotta wait for Angeal."

"Okay," she said, gingerly slipping her hands to the back of his neck. "Stay safe. Uh, safe as possible."

"Goes for you, too." He slid his hands to her hips. Bruised though she was, his touch was positively healing. She was sure of it. "I like a girl who's a bit of trouble, but you've taken it to an art form."

She sniggered weakly over her firing nerves. "You don't know the half of it."

Her heart jittered in her chest and the air got harder to breathe. She looked into his half-closed eyes under long lashes, content, fixated, unfocussed, on her lips. He leaned into her, fitting his mouth to hers, intending to pull away soon after. But her lips were like rose petals from which he couldn't bear to part, so he pulled her closer to his body.

His hand slipped into her waist of its own accord, lifting her shirt along with it, something which he would later swear was an accident, but a happy one all the same.

Reluctantly, she pulled an inch away, the taste of his lips lingering over hers. They shared a few unstable breaths in the space between them, and Aster only pulled apart properly after chewing her lip longingly, debating whether or not to leave. Her hands slipped down his shoulders and left him cold.

His face was adorably flushed, but she couldn't sit on her high horse—hers was, too.

Zack, somewhat tentatively, broke the silence. He spoke lightly, with a smile. "Didn't turn out to be such a great second date, did it?"

"What are you talking about?" she said with a faint laugh. "It was positively action-packed."

"I'm beginning to think you're some kind of nutcase."

"I'm beginning to think you might be right."

"I'll see you soon," he said, trailing his fingers from her hip to her arm and down to her hand, not willing to let go until the very last second.

"Yeah. See you soon."

Tseng was specific as to which floors Aster was permitted to access. Fifty-three through to fifty-five, for example, were strictly off-limits — even to high-ranking members of SOLDIER. Even to Zack. Apparently, that was where Tseng had been operating during the break-in, and where Cissnei, Rude and Reno currently remained. Aster couldn't stop herself from wondering: where was that other girl? Elena, wasn't it?

Aster cast a dark glance over Tseng. When the time comes, I'll have to trust you, too, he had said, many weeks ago. Did he trust her? Did she trust him? Who was this Elena? Why were they kept so rigidly, so deliberately apart?

Tseng turned to her as if feeling her eyes boring through his ponytail. "What now?"

The words wouldn't come. Rather her eyes dragged out over the disaster of the fifty-second floor once more. In a new light. The Mako glow from the nearest reactor stretched in through the shattered glass, throwing spiderweb shadows over the marble floor. A marble floor that had once been gleaming, now covered in a thin layer of concrete dust, bullets, empty magazines, shrapnel, armour, weapons. Carcasses. Blood.

Bodies.

In the silence, the phantom sound of pellets pinging against the floor haunted the air. But there was nothing. Nothing but the ghost of violence.

Tseng turned over the face of a Wutaian soldier with his foot. Dark eyes open, sunken in. Aster looked away.

"How do you manage it, Tseng?"

He turned to face her.

"How can you just kill like that?"

"We are the Turks," he said, moving his foot and allowing the deceased's head to roll back against the floor. It was hard to believe that life ever existed within that armour and uniform. Complete absence. "We do what must be done."

Perhaps 'we' simply removed the sense of responsibility on the individual. But she didn't challenge him.

"For the Company?" she asked.

He nodded and moved on without her. "And for the public interest, more often than I'm sure you'd expect."

"Do what must be done. Kill who must be killed," she murmured, looking at the shell of a man on the floor beside her. A man who had tried very hard to decapitate her. A man who may not have felt even an ounce of remorse if the roles were reversed.

"Even family."

She whirled around to regard Tseng's ponytail again. "Even family?"

Tseng knelt beside a felled infantryman and removed his helmet with more care than Aster thought he was capable. "Yes. If the situation calls for it. Even family."

He patted the lost youth down, eventually retrieving an identification and employee card from their pocket. Tseng didn't look at Aster. Not once. "It is often easier to have very little connection with anyone."

Aster's ribs clenched on her lungs and heart in the clutches of suspicion. She stepped towards him. "Why are you bringing this up?"

He sighed and stood, shoving the ID into his pocket, staring at something on the other side of the city. "I once lost family to the cause."

Her boots crunched into the glass beneath her feet as she trod closer to assess his face. No expression gave him away. Emotion was a valve sealed off.

"The Turks are many things. We are spies, yes, to put it crudely. Spearheads of a deceptively large intelligence agency. We are involved in recruitment. Personal security detail for President Shinra and his son. We are many things." Finally, with a face of sickly Mako-green and shadows, he looked at her. "But we are also SOLDIER-killers."

Aster didn't like where this was going.

"Renegade SOLDIER members are one of the largest threats to the Company. Not for their skills—one member of SOLDIER, strong as they may be, cannot take down a legion of their brethren unless they are another Sephiroth—but for the information locked within them. Industrial secrets are located in their very bodies.

"It is with this in mind that the Turks are employed to eradicate them. The Turks, though not enhanced, surpass SOLDIER, for it is we who must ultimately destroy them."

Aster's wide, pale blue eyes quivered.

Tseng looked away again. "Therefore, I could not tell you in good conscience that one day you might not be sent to murder Zack Fair."

Aster spat out her words like they burned. "That's ridiculous!"

He nodded and cupped his chin in his hand. "Yes. It certainly seems far from possible in the current state of affairs. It may never happen. I daresay it probably won't."

"But it could," he continued, "and it is simply a fact that you need to be aware of before making any important decisions. It is just as likely that you could be sent after Genesis Rhapsodos or Angeal Hewley. Or even myself. I merely use Fair as a poignant example."

Then he closed his eyes in thought. "This is all on the basis that you survive."

"For Gaia's sake," she hissed. A sharp, angry bite that snapped open the eyes of her predator. "Survive what?"

"Your test."

Tseng said no more. A further knot of frustration twisted in Aster's neck and the rest of the night played in silence. It was dawn before she was permitted to retire to the barracks. Her body was cold from that which seeped into her bones from the dead. The ice in her muscles made her heavy.

Security was extraordinarily tight, and she had to jump through hoops to be allowed back into the cadet basement that was practically on lockdown. Even as a Turk cadet, she was struggling to get from door A to door B. Eventually she was let into her bunker, as it were.

"Holy crap—"was the first thing out of Rex's mouth, but he interrupted himself by launching from his bed and slapping an arm around her in an over-tight hug. "The hell've you been? You look like shit."

A handful of cadets, including Matt whom she was relatively friendly with, and Rohrbach, too, gathered around her, since she was definitely the most interesting advancement over the past twelve hours. When news of the break-in broke, all cadets were locked down and in the dark.

And Rex wasn't wrong, either. Her shirt was splattered in her blood, some of Zack's, and a good splashing of Wutaian, and it had an open slash through it where she had narrowly escaped a stabbing and proceeded to be healed by Zack. Her pants, though dark, were bloodstained and dirty, and her boots were scratched, the soles embedded with shards of glass. Cracked, dried blood remained around her nostrils where Zack had not wanted to hurt her. A gash on her jawline looked like it needed stitching up and her cheekbone was growing purple through bruising. And that was just what could be seen.

Her voice crackled from disuse. "Uh, I was on the SOLDIER floor of HQ during the attack."

"Floor forty-nine," Rex muttered.

Matt butted in over him. "So, are the rumours true? They say it was a Wutaian invasion with the intent to steal the secret of SOLDIER."

Aster furrowed her brow and shrugged. "I have no idea. Maybe, I guess, but I've heard nothing. No one will tell me anything." She rolled her eyes and mumbled to Rex, "Nothing new there."

His lips quirked into a faint smirk whilst the youngest boy, barely fifteen years old, asked intently, "Did you get to fight any Wutaians?"

Of course, many boys and men joined the military specifically to fight the enemy in a direct attempt to protect their homes and families. It shouldn't have come as such a surprise that his young, wide eyes sparkled in anticipation of any stories she might have.

But it felt wrong. She shuffled her weight from foot to foot. "Yeah, I had to. It was that or get murdered."

A loud bang emanated from beyond the small crowd. Newberry's fist dented the metal cabinet beside his bed. He glared over at her but said nothing.

"I know you'd rather I died," she spat, but maybe deep down she was shaken.

Matt clamped a hand over her shoulder. "Ignore 'im. He's been all bent out of shape since you told 'im off."

She blinked and closely her fallen mouth, looking from Matt's face to those of the few around her. Almost like a wall. Support. Suddenly she didn't feel so isolated anymore.

"But you're alright, right?" Rex asked sincerely, ducking his head towards her and lowering his voice.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she said. "The clean up is well underway. They've been working tirelessly all night."

"Did you see Sephiroth?" Dylan-the young one-asked, eyes comically wide.

Aster couldn't stifle a laugh. "No, I didn't. I saw Angeal though; he kicked some real ass. Wouldn't wanna get on the wrong side of him. And Zack, too."

"What's he like?"

She cast her mind back to places it didn't want to go, not really. Images of his back smacking into marble and bouncing sickeningly, and images of the wound to his abdomen. But after getting them out of her system and thinking back to the spell that brought down an anti-SOLDIER unit in one hit, and the way the corded muscles of his arms swung around his sword like it was feather-light, she was able to really grasp what kind of incredible he was. His focus, his reflexes, his strength. He was first class. First Class SOLDIER. A prodigy.

"He's…unbelievable." She shook her head of the thoughts and smiled. "Really, he's phenomenal. He's a goalpost for everyone. What anyone should strive to be like."

Rex shot her a knowing look, but she didn't notice.

She spent the next fifteen minutes telling an extremely redacted version of the day's events. For instance, she entirely skipped over why she was in the Shinra Building in the first place, and didn't even mention the elevator shaft incident at all—although she did go on to tell the fullest version of the story to Rex late that evening from their favourite spot on the rooftop—she instead told them about the Wutaians that 'accosted her in a library' that she had 'found herself in when responding to Tseng's orders', and went on to explain that she ran into Zack Fair several floors above where he proceeded to wreak absolute, unadulterated havoc on the anti-SOLDIER monsters. She ended on the truth, but didn't go on to say that she accompanied Zack to the infirmary, neither did she include the part where she melted beneath his kiss. She shuddered as the memory struck her spine like a match.

She already missed him.

One of the boys whistled in awe of the enormity of the situation that enshrouded HQ and strode midway up the room where he flopped on his bed.

"Yeah," she said in agreement with his sentiment. "I feel that on a personal level. Now, I need a shower."

"Wasn't gonna say anything," Rex said with a grin.

Poking her tongue out at him, she grabbed a clean, brand new, aka non-shredded uniform from her cabinet and headed beyond into the shower room.

The room was stuffy and wildly overheated, which was novel since Aster had only ever experienced it first thing in the morning and late in the evening when only ice spewed from the showerheads. The tiled floor and walls were fogged up and slippery from condensation, and Aster smelt what was undeniably menthol forcibly cleansing her nostrils. She rubbed away the sensation on the back of her hand, and it came away with flakes of dry blood. All the more reason to take a shower.

She hung her military-provided underwear on the hook inside the cubicle—the one she always used, as she was a creature of habit—and left her clean clothing just outside so it mightn't get soaked, with her towel thrown over the door.

Steamy water doused her body. This is what her life had come to. A five-minute hot shower and almost a whole bar of the cheapest soap available had become one of her greatest escapes and her third favourite luxury—luxury number one, of course, being time spent with Zack, and luxury two being with Tifa in the bar.

When she reached for her towel, it was swept from her reach and over the door.

"Hilarious, Rex," she growled, knocking on the inside of her door. "Give it back."

"Come and get it."

Her body froze. That was not Rex's lazy drawl. Goosebumps raised on her skin, but not from the shock of cold after a hot shower. From the lick of a dark tongue that was not supposed to speak.

She fairly ripped her underwear from the hook that was, praise the Goddess, inside the shower stall, yanked on the nude coloured sports bra and underwear and steadied her shaking fists before she dared open the door.

Newberry stood with her towel draped over his shoulder and flicked the lock of the shower room door. Her heart rate soared and her nostrils flared. The door was glass—someone would see. There would be witnesses. Right?

"Geez. Do you even need a bra, princess? Doesn't look like it's holding much. You're built like a little boy."

"What is it this time?" she snapped. Her instinct was to hide the fear. If he was a beast, she didn't want him absorbing triumph from her panic. Sniffing her fright. "Embarrassed? Is that it? Wanted to humiliate me to get your own back? You should know by now it's harder than this."

"You don't understand," he snarled, voice ripping from somewhere deep inside him. The voice of a destroyed soul in a body that couldn't take the weight. "I won't let you stand there and brag about all the disgusting things that you've done. Retelling that story as if you're some kind of hero."

"I didn't say I was a hero," she snapped.

"Then have some goddamn respect for the dead," he screamed. "All of those lives lost—they won't be reborn!"

The infantrymen, lying against the cold marble as it became covered in their life-giving blood. She fought for them. Aster immediately faltered, but couldn't let it be seen, so she squeezed her eyes shut and retorted, "What are you, some kind of pacifist? Why are you fighting if not to protect our people?"

"I am fighting to protect my people! Life is too precious to waste now—I can't stand your attitude—while you celebrate over victory, there are so many more who can't revel in it with you."

He stormed over to her and dug his fingers deep into her shoulders. "Why did you survive and not them!"

He threw her down, her legs sweeping from beneath her on the slippery tiles, slamming her back and head into the ground amongst the suds and condensation. Sparks flew in the corners of her eyes. Dark spots appeared in her vision.

Everything ached. She arched her back and tried to move, but slipped back into the tiles. It was so steamy, she could hardly see his dark shadow through the fog. Quickly she realised he'd set this up.

As he neared her, she could make out only one thing through the cloud. Hatred.

But…why?

Where did his all-encompassing hatred come from? What made him this way? Her voice came out in a croak as the haze threatened to take her. "What…the hell…did you lose?"

He crouched to grab a fistful of her hair and pulled her face to his. "Everything."

The only mercy was that as soon as he smashed her skull into the tiles, she was out like a light.