Chapter 8

[Part 22]

The morning was cool and crisp, a dawn waiting to arise from its ashes and bring forth a newborn ray of hope to the unforgiving sins cloaking the miles of Trion. While the night crawlers of the impecunious city disappeared into their rotting nests to rest their drug-addicted bodies, the good citizens of Trion finally had a moment of peace that only came during this rare time of day. There was a chilling silence that hung in the air as a breeze wisped through the dark corners of deserted streets while the rooftops of buildings began to brighten with a streak of orange yellow light. Although most of the grounds of Trion were captivated in a brief sleeping spell, the hospital was still running as active as the night before.

The building didn't have a long line of patients waiting through the front door as it had hours ago when Vincent and Selphie brought the badly injured cashier to receive treatment for his wounds. However, there were still people remaining in the cramped waiting room when the two young adults walked through the hospital's corridors again.

Upon arriving, they were greeted by Ms. Cahokia, the doctor's second personal assistant. She had just finished filling out a form on an old clipboard and handed it to a man working at the front desk when she turned and saw a familiar face.

"Vincent?" she asked with uncertainty. She was well in her mid thirties with grays that aged her beyond her years. Being a nurse in that hospital for years has gifted her with wrinkles of stress and worn feet as she shuffled towards the two.

"My, oh my, is that you?" she chuckled deep in her throat with a dull harmony that lit with a hint of sadness and a wave of warmth. She smiled kindly at the young man who welcomed her with opened arms.

"Ms. Cahokia!" he said happily giving her a big hug. She held him out taking in every detail of him as her eyes twinkled with tears.

"Look at you!" she cried. "All grown up and handsome as ever." She squeezed his cheek shaking it playfully as she hugged him again.

"Aw, stop it, you're embarrassing me!" he said wrinkling his nose with a smile. She kissed him lightly on the forehead as she held his face in her small hands. She sighed quietly as she shook her head slightly with disbelief.

"So many years...and you finally came back!" she choked out. She suddenly pushed him away as she scolded him with her index finger. "But you, young man, got a lot of explaining to do! Where have you been all this time? Why didn't you tell us you were going to leave? And why in God's name did you run away?"

Selphie was cut off guard a bit as she heard this. Run away? Him? You got to be kidding me, she thought to herself. Vincent frowned as he cut Ms. Cahokia off from her bombarding wave of questions. "Wow, hold on, wait a second!" He put up his hands signing for her to stop. "Yes, I know I've been...away, but I promise I'll explain everything when I come back."

"What?" she asked as her forehead crinkled with disappointment. "Oh no, don't tell me you're going to just leave us again, mister, oh no you certainly are not!"

"No, it's not like that, Ms. Cahokia!" he reassured her. "I'm not going anywhere, it's just that..." he turned his head and looked at Selphie who stood quietly nearby. "We need to get some supplies for a patient I've just operated on and—

"My goodness, child! Who on earth did this to you?" Ms. Cahokia had exclaimed as she walked over to the young woman. She had twirled and turned Selphie's body examining her cuts and bruises that overlapped the smoothness of her skin. They've become more discolored and swollen than before.

Selphie had opened her mouth to respond, but she couldn't say who had been responsible for her injuries. Vincent broke the awkward moment by cutting in, "I'm sorry Ms. Cahokia, but we're really in a hurry."

"Oh? How so?" Ms. Cahokia pondered. "Well, I can get those supplies for you once I treat your girlfriend."

She was referring to Selphie as she waited expectantly for an answer. Vincent was dumbfounded for a second as he caught Selphie giving him a skeptical yet expectant look teasing behind her cat-like eyes. The young man blushed at this feeling a rush of heat burn on the apples of his cheeks.

"Us..." he let out a laughing breath. "No, you got it all wrong.... we're not...she's just... a friend."

"I see..." the woman said suspicious of his stumble of words. "My apologies then."

"Nah, it's all right. We've got a huge setback though. My patient's lost an incredibly large amount of blood. He's stable...for now. But with all these people..." he said referring to the crowd waiting in the cramped waiting room. "We wanted to know if we could bring him in for a blood transfusion. In his condition, his fatality is currently immeasurable."

Ms. Cahokia was about to speak as she was urgently interrupted by one of the hospital's staff members. She wore her dark hair in a bun with a plastic bag tied over her hair along with long pants that was torn here and there with a tight t-shirt stained in dried up blood and sweat. She ran towards Ms. Cahokia holding her arms up at her sides in order to keep her gloves from dripping any more blood than it already had.

"Ms. Cahokia!" she said breathlessly. She breathed heavily as she regained her posture.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Doctor Kadoka needs your assistance immediately! He is about to perform the bypass surgery for the bullet wound patient in room fifty-seven," the woman reported to the doctor's assistant quickly.

"Bypass surgery...?" she thought out loud. "Is that man insane? I specifically told him that this patient needed to be operated right through the wound. He's going to increase the possibility of having the patient receive damage beyond repair in order to operate!"

"I know, Ms. Cahokia, I told him this before but he wouldn't listen," the woman replied. "He knows that he is putting the patient in high risk, but the patient insists the doctor that he performs the surgical remove now."

"Crazy fool!" she exclaimed. "Do you see what I must put up with around here?" She said turning to the two young adults. "I'm so sorry Vincent, but I must attend this patient before that idiotic doctor makes him worse. Whatever you need talk to someone at the front desk, but come visit us, you hear?"

"Yeah, I will," Vincent nodded faithfully. With that, she turned on her heel and stormed away into the stair well of the building. He paused for a second to think of what to do next. A tap on the shoulder interrupted his thoughts.

"Let's talk to the front desk. Someone there can help us," she told him as the two began to walk speedily towards a man in his late thirties filling out a green colored form. "Excuse me?" The man looked up at Selphie's voice and smiled politely.

"Morning y'all, need some help?" he asked them.

"Yeah, Ms. Cahokia told us to come here if we needed anything," Vincent told the man.

"And what's it that you need?" he put down his pen and pushed the forms aside cupping his hands together on the counter.

"I have a patient that I just operated on," said the young man.

"Why didn't you bring him here?" he asked with furrowed brows.

"We were going to," Selphie stepped in, "but the place was way too crowded so we decided not to bring him over."

"Ah, I see..." he rubbed his chin as he stood up from his folding chair. "You need some meds for the fella?"

"Some bandages and such, but mainly the pain killers. This guy had a huge splinter lodged in his shoulder from something."

"You know what that something is?" he began to shuffle out of his workspace and across the hallway to a storage room.

"Nah, didn't have time to ask," replied Vincent. "Looks like he fell on it but I'm not so sure."

The man laughed as he pulled out a rusted ring with keys to every lock in the building dangling against each other. "Sounds like that boy's got a pretty tough noggin if he made it through a fall like that! Look at this old hunk of greasy pizza and cold soda pops. Me? I'm only thirty-four and already these days been turning me into an old geezer."

"Aw, come on pop, you don't even look it!" Selphie exclaimed encouragingly.

"Would you look at that...?" he whistled tipping his cap slightly over his forehead. "Little missy here tells me I ain't no oldie, and she goes and calls me pop!" He chuckled lightheartedly pinching Selphie's giggling face. "You's got a fine young lady here kid."

"Again...?" Vincent mumbled. "She's not my girl, she's just... a friend."

"That's right, you keep thinking that," the man replied full of sarcasm. He picked open the lock with a small silver key opening the door to reveal a roughly large room filled with supplies, tools, and medicines used for patients. "Alrighty then, get what you need, then get with your lady friend. I got lots of papers and what not to fill, so just hurry on."

"Okay gramps," Selphie joked.

He stood at the doorway shaking his index finger threateningly at the young woman, but put it down as he shook his head exasperatedly. "You's a handful of somethin' you know that?" Sighing with defeat, he guided Vincent through the room. "So what y'all been doing that got you here?"

"The diner I've been working at got robbed again. That should explain the cashier that I dropped off earlier," he said agitatedly.

"Again, huh?" he said shaking his head disturbed. "Must be them Reds again...I'll be damned if it isn't them. They've been causing a ruckus all week. Patients nonstop for days..." His voice was no longer audible hidden in his grumbling.

Vincent peered at Selphie who appeared distant as she avoided eye contact with anyone else in the room. What's wrong with her? He thought. Probably still traumatized from last night. Clearing his throat, he continued, "Yeah, it was. They were stealing some stuff, but luckily I had a friend come and help."

"Oh really? And who is this friend if I may ask?" he walked over to the counter where he searched through the drawers filled with the necessities of a first aid kit. The young man scorned a bit as he tried to remember the teenager's name.

"Eh, well, he's not really my friend, we kind of just met last night. He came in with a deadbeat cycle that needed some work done on it. He's got a Black Ninja XRV actually," he said as a matter-of-factly.

"Ah..." the man nodded with interest. "Haven't seen those since this came along." He pointed at the bald spot on his head. He mumbled as he walked around the room in search of supplies. "He from afar?"

"Yeah, he said he came from the Galbadia military camp," he pointed out.

Selphie, who had been pacing slowly about looking at the wonders of the storage room, suddenly froze in her tracks and spun around swiftly. Her hand hit a tray sticking out from a small cart standing next to a stool. The loud clanging sound made them jump with surprise.

"Oh my...I'm so sorry," she said briskly jumping down onto her knees to pick up the spilled contents of the tray.

"It's all right. That darn tray's been falling all week," the man said with a passing grin. "Galbadia, eh? Seems a little far don't you think?"

He laughed lightly as he replied, "That's what I asked him. Spira's a huge continent. I really don't know why he'd pick this dump to come to."

Selphie stood up shakily nearly dropping the tray again as she stepped backwards to lean against the counter for support. What's his name? She asked frantically in her mind. You idiot, what's his name! She stuffed her fists into the pockets of her jeans as she gripped her hands tightly to keep from screaming.

"Mission for Galbadia perhaps?" the man unlocked another door at the end of the room to a large closet full of bottles of medicine. Most of them were labeled with prescriptions to people in Trion, but some were non-prescript aspirin, painkillers, or meds to give to patients.

"No, I don't think so. He said somebody in Trion sent him some letter saying something about a girl he knew. Old Cid was stalking him around when I took his cycle. Guess he's looking for that lady, Edea, too," Vincent hopped onto the counter leaning forward with the support of his arms. He looked over at Selphie who was as white as a ghost. She seemed to be panicking, but the thought was dismissed from his mind as the man cut in.

"Edea?" he asked. "Say what? It's been, like, six months now? She probably ran off with some perverted fellow long ago."

"Maybe...but this kid isn't like that. I think there's more to it, but the Reds were junking our diner before we talked much about it," the last sentence slipped from his tongue as he realized that Selphie was still in the room. She looked away painfully as he silently beat himself up for it. Nice going bud. The girl's probably still scared.

"Are you bringing him in later?" he pulled a white bottle of painkillers from the shelf. It had plastic dividers with bottles filling each row. "Sounds like the Doc should check him up a bit."

"Yeah, I injected some narcotics for him. The operation would be a hell of a lot of pain for the guy, so I figured, better knock him out cold." he said remembering the long and exhausting operation.

"Just pop four of these suckers in, two in the morning the next at night. You seem to know what you're doing so I think you can take it from there," he told the intent young man who nodded in response. He picked up the first aid kit from the counter and handed it to him. "We'll take care of that cashier for you. You just take little missy over there and treat those cuts and bruises. I notice she got some on her neck and arms."

He let out a breath of appreciation as he smiled. "Thanks man, appreciate it. Come on Selphie, let's go!" She was torn from her daze as she snapped back into reality. Her hands flew from her pockets as she sluggishly walked over towards the young man that awaited her at the door.

"Oh wait, Miss?" Selphie turned around at the older man's voice. "Take care of yourself. I seen worse from girls round here, but whoever did this to you ain't worth single breadcrumb, you's more than that."

The young woman nodded wearily as she felt a hand slither gently on her wrist. She saw Vincent as he pulled her through the door. "I'm bringing the kid here, so maybe I'll see you later!"

"I'd better not," he grumbled sarcastically.

They left hastily walking towards Vincent's home located two blocks down from Doctor Kadoka's office. Selphie was silent most of the way and clung to her small messenger bag heavy with the first aid kit. Vincent was walking rubbing his hands together blowing into them as he hunched his shoulders forward and dug his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

"Does it still hurt?" She saw Vincent eye the bruise on her neck with concern.

"Um, sometimes. It's not as bad as it looks."

He nodded. "That's good. I got some ointment from the Doc's place. It should help with the swelling."

"Oh...thank you," she said unconsciously.

Her thoughts were still on Cloud as she and Vincent made their way through the streets. In Selphie's mind, she was joggled with questions. I can't believe I didn't see it! It's him! But what if it isn't? Maybe it's just a coincidence... Her shivering interrupted her thoughts. It was far too cold to be out walking the streets. Finally, I can get out of this goddamn hellhole. And nobody's going to stop me.

[Part 23]

A flock of birds stealthily maneuvered above the thick spiral of fog swirling from white puffs of cotton into gray layers of smoke. The leader of the group led his followers away from the dangers of the roaring thunder clasp. A storm circulated amongst the skies threatening to spear a bolt of lightening through its clouds as it anxiously waits to shed its doleful tears. Slowly, the parched soils of Trion were replenished with droplets of life that the sun had treacherously stolen from them.

The voice of the raining waterfall patted against the blemished roof of Vincent's grungy house breaking the cold silence that hung thickly in the stuffy room. Taking in a deep gulp of air, the raspy dryness of the teenager's throat became unbearably painful causing him to cough uncontrollably. Dust was trapped in his lungs as he struggled to breathe evenly.

Opening the heavy shades of his eyelids, Cloud managed to peek through the hazy slits and take in the obscure darkness of the room. Through a screened window, the weak sun's faithful glow cascaded through the white veil sheet illuminating its light over the teen's resting body. Lucent shadows of raindrops run across his bandaged shoulder as images of a thunderstorm began to plague his mind.

The face of the stranger appeared in his eyes as he rubbed them awake. He slowly pulled himself up into a sitting position on the worn couch. Whisks of pointy thread roughly scathed his skin as he turned and brought his feet to the floor.

My head's killing me, he thought grimly. His body felt sore within every stretch of his muscles. Small movements seemed difficult, and his skin stung all over from the cuts that smelled of rubbing alcohol. His shoulder was thickly wrapped in an off-white colored bandage with the crease of a patch beneath its many layers, but spots of red appeared to have seeped through the fabric. Cloud sighed in relief of having the humongous wooden spike jammed inside his body removed.

The teenager's mind blanked out from time to time, rendering him with a sickening feeling of being drunk accompanied by the slithering nausea spreading through his stomach. Yet his mind wondered back to the face of the stranger. That girl... he pondered weakly. I know I seen her somewhere, but where?

He thought about his dream again when his full state of consciousness was brought back to him. Still exhausted and groggy from the operation, he stumbled even when he stood up slowly to put back on his sleeveless shirt.

"Son-of-a— Ah! Damn it!" he barked as he struggled to slide the shirt over his head. He sucked in air through his gritted teeth as he found his military pack. Leaning against the front door, he dug through his pockets until he fingered a small folded piece of paper. Taking it out, he opened it and read the message for the millionth time that night.

"Edea Matrone," he mumbled. "Who are you? What do you want from me?" He tilted his head back and rested it against the door listening to the raindrops tapping against the house. "Are you from my past?"

He waited.

Give me a sign, he silently wished. Anything... I don't know what hell I'm suppose to do. Nothing happened. He got tired of waiting when a wave of determination shocked through the course of his body. "I'm going to find you, whoever you are...and maybe, you got the answers I'm looking for."

He turned around and grasped the doorknob opening it to reveal a foggy road hidden by a curtain of falling raindrops. Exhaling sharply, he walked out of Vincent's house feeling the cold dash of wind and water rush down his back. He shivered when suddenly he froze. It's them, he thought as he sensed the young adults sprinting down the road. He hurriedly dragged his way behind a car that appeared to be smashed long ago as he hid away from Vincent and Selphie's view.

Once they were inside, Cloud broke into a run. His muscles screamed in agony for him to stop. His heart screeched with desperation to have rest. His shoulder felt like it was being torn beyond repair, and his lungs felt like they had no elasticity left to take in air. Everything in his existence cried for a warm bed and hot milk to take away the chills quivering through his spine, but his soul ordered him to run.

Cloud ran nearly two blocks until he couldn't lift his legs any longer. The teen let out a hoarse cry of defeat as he wobbled about taking in deep breaths of the freezing air. With one last grunt, he felt his knees give out as he collapsed against the curb of a quiet road. He felt his consciousness drift away as he listened to the steady beating drum of rain.

In the distance, he could hear footsteps splashing through the flooding street come toward him. He was far too tired and fatigued to open his eyes to see whether it was Selphie or Vincent coming to take him back home. The footsteps stopped by his side as he felt a pair of gentle hands grasp his arm. It felt unfamiliar, causing him to peek once again through his heavy eyelids. He expected to see the short auburn haired woman who'd helped him alongside of Vincent.

Instead, he caught a glimpse of a girl with emerald eyes.