Discliamer: I don't own FFVII.

For Her

We were on vacation. On vacation, enemies may not still be enemies, but friends are still friends.

I was drunk and off work, yet somehow I still managed to run into AVALANCHE. Hell, I had been wasting my time (and myself) at some orient bar while mindlessly fiddling with chop sticks, and within the next moment I was ready to pull out my gun or rod in a snap. And I still was worried for her life. There is nothing worse than worrying about someone you know can perfectly well take care of themselves, than worrying about them when they can't. Trust me on this. Hell, I even worked with the men I was assigned to kill (on a regular work day), just to get her off that mountain.

Now, seeing her hanging there upside down wasn't all that bad, but please remember, that this was after the worry had subsided and had given way to the effects of the alcohol in my system. But, there are better things I can remember of her than what she was to me when I was drunk…I remember that night….

I used to live with a real nice girl when I lived down in the slums (this was before my days as a Turk), and every once in a while I can remember parts of those little lectures she'd give me on morals or the lessons she'd try and teach me. I remember walking into the restaurant that I knew Elena would still be waiting in that night, and the only thing I could hear in my mind was the voice of that girl speaking softly to me.

"Reno, you think because we're below that plate that you can be as bad as the rest? Well we can rise above our raisin', just like we can rise above that plate. Just like we can see the stars. Remember Reno, actions speak louder than words."

I saw Elena sitting at one of those two-person tables by herself as I walked over to her. When I got to where she was, twirling her spoon in her water in thought, she looked up confused. Confused as to why I was there and not, well……anyway, I just closed my eyes and bowed my head. I heard her start sobbing a few seconds later.

I half led-half carried her out of the building slowly; the direction in which her feet were moving being one of the last things on her mind. I remember helping her in my black car and driving her home. For the entire trip she didn't stop crying and I never said a word.

I didn't see her again over the next two days (in which time I learned she had traveled north to Icicle, but for what I still have no idea), but I saw a clipping from the newspaper obituaries in one of her folders when I did next see her.

It was then that everyone saw the changes the incident had - and still has - on her. I mean, yeah, Rude would go out and get drunk then come back, shut the door to his office and turn on some classical music, like Mozart or something, but that was different because he had always been one to stay in his office. It wasn't new to see him always locked away in his office. But it was to see it happen to Elena. No one would see her all day, except maybe if you watched for her to leave at night, and by then her office looked as if it had been razed. White papers would be strewn all about her desk in a fashion that she never would have allowed had she still had the need to leave an impression on someone.

I would take care to straighten things up in there a bit before I left sometimes, just so it was more like it used to be. I'm not really sure she noticed the difference in the morning, but I still felt I should do it, even if we never made mention of it. I mean, Hell, actions speak louder than words, right? If she didn't even notice what I did, how would she care what I said? It wasn't worth mentioning, only worth doing. For her.