It happens on a Thursday evening.
She's having such a nice time, having left Headquarters early due to dinner reservations at a place in Sector Eight, a night that's been planned for three weeks, rescheduled once when Reeve had been forced to stay late. He had even bought her new jewelry for the occasion, a pair of diamond earrings that hang heavy and expensive on her ears, her hair pinned back for others to see.
Much of their conversation is spent happily abusing their fellow coworkers, flirting in low voices over the table, or talking wedding details. While Charlie can't deny that he has an eye for taste, sometimes she has to force his own opinion out of him about certain things, until it's finally uttered uneasily and immediately brushed off by him.
Her father did that to him, she can't help but think. Her father had brushed him off and dismissed his ideas so often and so easily and, at times, rather cruelly, and ultimately crushed Reeve's spirit.
And in between conversation, a smoky-voiced singer sings upon the stage, mere feet from their table, backed by a small jazz band. His arm rests upon the back of her chair, and Charlie watches the entertainment with a smile on her face, completely and incandescently happy.
It all happens all at once, within seconds, so quickly that Charlie isn't quite certain what happens first.
There's a resounding boom, the sound of jets soaring through the air multiplied by a thousand, so loud that it seems to rattle the entire building, shattering all of the windows. The ground quakes violently beneath her feet, the lights all pop and shower sparks down upon everyone's heads to leave them in the dark, the night sky through the tall windows is momentarily blindingly bright as morning, something invisible hits her in the chest with the force of a train, and something warm washes over her, searing her fair skin.
When she opens her eyes again, it's to inhale loudly and deeply, gasping for air that's choked with thick black smoke. She's lying flat on her back, looking up at the night sky—the sky—and the screams haven't ceased. Even with the ringing in her head, she can hear the screams.
The wind has been knocked out of her, and she isn't sure how long she's been unconscious. She continues to gasp for air, out of breath and feeling as if she's drowning. Her heart beats painfully quick, and it takes her what feels like hours to breathe properly again.
Nearly the entire restaurant has collapsed, stone walls crumbling, the interior burning, a blazing fire cracking and popping and brightening the exposed, darkened street, surrounding her and slowly trapping her inside the building. Massive pieces of stone lay around her, having smashed the tables and the stage and several people, some of them screaming at her as Charlie pushes some debris off her body with trembling arms, pushing herself very slowly onto her hands and knees and willing herself not to vomit.
"Reeve?" Charlie shouts hoarsely, getting unsteadily to her feet and stumbling over a pile of rubble, thankful she hadn't lost her shoes. She coughs, trying to catch sight of him through the smoke-filled air. What the hell happened here? An assassination attempt? Did someone know we were here? "Reeve!"
She screams when fingers clench around her ankle, turning to find a woman looking up at her from under a piece of the ceiling, her face covered in blood. "Help me," she begs, but Charlie stumbles backwards, suddenly afraid.
There's nothing she can do.
"Reeve!"
Charlie trips again, a dry sob escaping her lips as she falls to her knees, sharp edges of stone digging into her skin. But the thing she has tripped over catches her attention, the silhouette of a broad-shouldered and dark-haired man lying on his side in a torn and dusty suit, the fabric slightly singed in places.
She crawls to his side, rolling him onto his side, her breath hitching. His face is covered in a thick layer of white dust and a spattering of blood from a deep gash at his hairline.
"Reeve!" Charlie taps his cheek firmly, covering his body with her own as she feels another tremor that shifts around the remains of the restaurant, and something very close to them explodes, sending a wave of warm air to wash over them. After a moment, when she's sure it's safe again, she touches his face again, desperate. "Reeve, please wake up. Please, we have to get out of he—"
He coughs suddenly, eyes fluttering open as if he's staring directly into the sun.
"Are you all right?" she asks, heart still pounding, afraid to wrap her arms around him and find that he's broken some bones or is seriously hurt. Her hands hover over his chest, shaking.
Reeve groans, but Charlie forces him into a sitting position, looking around for a way back out into the street. "What happened?" he asks, still blinking very slowly, his eyes glazed over. "Charlie, you're bleeding—"
"So are you," she says, the adrenaline coursing through her keeping the pain at bay. She isn't even sure where she's bleeding from. "We have to go—can you stand?"
Charlie has to pry a heavy stone off his foot, digging his leg out of debris. It's torn his pant leg, blood running down his already bruising calf, but nothing seems broken, and she's able to help him to his feet as she wobbles dangerously on the uneven ground in her heels.
The two of them wade through the debris, choking on the fumes and smoke, faces blackened with soot, reddened with blood, shining with sweat, clinging to each other's hands. She can't even escape the heat at all—in the streets, the fire continues to spread at an alarming pace through shops and apartment buildings, and Charlie's hair sticks to her cheeks and neck, sweat running down her spine in rivulets.
"The reactor—" Reeve tells her hoarsely, pointing towards the towering reactor on the edge of the plate, dark gray smoke pouring from the top and polluting the air, smaller explosions still going off every few minutes, the entire thing in danger of collapsing or going up completely in flames.
It's burning, and the entire sector is on fire and the screaming echoes in the night alongside the emergency announcements via Shinra Inc., and people are burning while they run out of their homes, and buildings are crumbling with people inside, and she and Reeve are being jostled around by people running up and down the streets, screaming for help, looking for their family members and loved ones.
No, no, no, she thinks, it wasn't supposed to be like this.
Charlie looks around, horrified with the sight presented to her. Her head throbs unbearably, and when she holds up her arm, it's to find her forearm bears a shiny pink burn that looks inflamed, and blood drips from her scraped up knees and she doesn't think she can hear well out of her right ear, because Reeve looks to be talking, but she can't hear a word he's saying.
It was only supposed to blow the core, she thinks again, not this, never this.
Downed power lines continue to spark and explode, the roofs of buildings shake and collapse. The restaurant they had been in is completely in ruins. A woman whose shirt is on fire runs up to her, screaming bloody murder, incoherent and wide-eyed, gripping her shoulders tight before sprinting off into the night, the fire spreading from her shirt to her hair, the screams haunting.
There's a horrible stink, like charred meat and sulfur and smoke, and Charlie can't breathe can't breathe can't breathe, looking around again at the fiery sector, dead bodies in the street that are bloodied and burned and crushed, her chest heaving.
"Charlie!"
She turns to look up at Reeve. "We have to help them," she croaks, still holding onto his hand, squeezing so tight that they'll have to pry her off him. "We have to help—"
He nods, far more composed than she is, or at least he looks composed from her perspective. The moment he releases her hand to help the nearest available victims, Charlie lingers, watching him help an eldery couple to his feet, pointing towards the Shinra building that dominates the skyline, even at night, right in the middle of the city.
"Mama! Mama!"
"Please! Help us!"
"Daddy! Wake up, daddy!"
Charlie continues to breathe quickly, covering her ears with her hands and closing her eyes, afraid to see the destruction that her bomb has caused, afraid to hear the screams of those her bomb had hurt. She sinks to her knees, unsure if she's able to stand any longer, crying into the darkness and silence, the flames bright against her eyelids and hot against her skin.
Someone touches her wrists—how could she not know that touch?—and then cradles her face, warm and damp hands upon her cheeks. Charlie opens her eyes to find Reeve looking at her, talking to her. She uncovers her ears to listen, ashamed of the tears rolling down her cheeks.
"It's all right, it's all right," he's telling her, wiping at the sweat and blood on her face. "Charlotte, it's all right—"
The ground shifts again, and for a moment, Charlie thinks the plate is crumbling, and imagines them falling all the way to their deaths in the slums far below them. There's another round of screams that split the night, the sound of sirens blaring, and there's the loud rumbling of another explosion off the reactor.
Reeve wraps his arms around her, his back facing the reactor as a few more power lines pop nearby. Charlie buries her face into his chest, wiping her tears off on his shirt. When she pulls away, his white dress shirt is covered with smeared blood and soot.
That couldn't have been my bomb . . .
"We have to get as many people as possible to Headquarters. It's safe there," he tells her, standing with her. "Go flag down an emergency vehicle and have them bring you—"
"No, I want to help," she replies, and Reeve gives her an exasperated smile before nodding.
They break off in different directions, Charlie heading towards a large residential building on the brink of collapse, with people waving out their windows, shouting for help or trying to slide down makeshift ropes that are made up of sheets tied together or clothes. Debris blocks emergency stairwells, keeping a family trapped up on the upper floors.
I need to find someone I can help, Charlie tells herself, but walking away from people in need leaves a bad taste in her mouth.
"Please! You have to go to the Shinra building!" Charlie yells, kneeling down to help a few young men lift a piece of rock lying on a crying woman's torso.
The woman is able to be pulled to safety by one of the men, but her leg is broken badly, and Charlie has to call some nearby medics to have her transported to Headquarters in the back of an armored truck.
"Miss Shinra, we'll take it from here," one of the men tells her, a bandana covering his mouth and nose. "We'll make sure we send everyone we can to Shinra HQ."
Charlie leaves them, but doesn't immediately leave the area. She wanders around, looking for people to help. The ground is littered in bodies, unconscious or dead, she can't say for certain. The collapsing of buildings have left the streets stained with blood, and she almost vomits at the sight of someone's head half-crushed by tons of stone.
A girl no older than five stands in the middle of the busy street, crying out for her mother and father. Charlie carries her to the nearest truck, urging them to bring the girl back to Headquarters.
A gray-haired man is buried under the remains of his house, legs crushed beneath the weight of the second story, reaching out for Charlie as she passes. She and the young man with the bandana help dig him out, and Charlie has to look away from the awkward angle his legs are bent.
She helps everyone she can, until the tremors and explosions have ceased, until until the fires are slowly burning down of their own accord, still dangerously high and licking the night sky, but done spreading faster than anyone can escape.
Charlie spends too much time looking for Reeve, people shoulder-checking her on their way to the next sector, hardly recognizing her through the mask of soot she wears, trying not to trip or break the heels of her shoes, lifting the front of her dress so it doesn't get caught and tear right off her body.
Shinra helicopters begin to circle the area, spotlights shining down on the citizens fleeing their destroyed homes, the fire, the last minute explosions coming from the reactor.
When Reeve finally finds her, he looks in worse shape than when she left him, his suit jacket completely missing and his sleeves rolled up, the skin of his hands and forearms stained red. The injury on his forehead still leaks blood down the side of his face, eyes still unfocused and limping slightly as he approaches her.
"Reeve—"
"Don't worry," he assures her, taking her into his bloodstained arms. "I have a truck that's going to take us back to Headquarters. Are you all right?"
"All of those people—"
His mouth is a tight, thin line. "I know."
"We have to help them—"
"We've done what we can," he says, touching her shoulders and leading her towards the nearest truck, the back doors open wide, security standing on either side. "You need to get somewhere safe. I'll stay behind, and I'll meet you in—"
"No!" Charlie shouts, standing her ground before hopping into the back of the truck, where she'll be alone and frightened. "No, you can't! I'll go with you—"
"Your life is far more important than mine," Reeve says, wiping off her face with his palm and kissing her on the mouth. "Are you sure you're all right?" With an arm around her, he tries to urge her into the truck, but she refuses, panicking. "You need to go see a doctor, Charlotte, please get into the truck—"
"No," she counters, squirming in his hold, fighting him. "I'm not leaving without you—"
"Charlie, get in the fucking truck!"
She looks over her shoulder, bewildered, to find Reno hanging out of the driver's side window, looking at her with wide eyes and shouting at her. Glancing back at Reeve, her resolve weakening with the mounting amount of dead and dying bodies dropping around her, Charlie kisses Reeve hard again on the lips, forgoing the back of the truck completely to sit in the passenger seat, where Tseng is already sitting.
Tseng has to pull her up, sliding closer to Reno to allow her space, her entire body aching and burning and in pain.
"Put your goddamn seatbelt on," Reno says almost pleadingly, but Charlie ignores him, her arms too heavy to lift. "Shit, you're in bad shape, Charlie."
Tseng has to reach across to put her seatbelt on for her, with Charlie's mind a world away, in a fog.
She turns her head to look out the window, looking down to see Reeve holding a hand to the window, fingertips pressed against the glass, smiling reassuringly at her, though it's hardly convincing, more of a painful grimace.
"No," Charlie moans, sitting up straighter and crying out as her entire body throbs. "No, we can't leave him here—"
"He'll be fine. He's a big boy," Reno replies casually.
"No, let him in—stop—we can't leave without him!"
"We gotta go!"
"He'll be fine," Tseng supplies, straightening her as she begins to slouch against him, her eyes growing heavy, seeing stars. "We need to get you back to safety."
The going is slow, however, with people flooding the street. Reno curses loudly and screams to no one in particular when they get in the way of his truck, blocking roads meant for emergency vehicles, but as they grow closer to the middle of the city, towards Shinra Headquarters, the damage isn't as bad, and some places haven't been touched at all, save for some thinning smoke that permeates the air.
"Tseng, please—"
"We can't turn around now, Charlotte," Tseng says in a low voice. Reno looks sideways at her and cringes. She's afraid to look at her reflection, afraid to move, afraid of the pain that will certainly hit her like a car. "Don't worry, he'll be all right. Someone will go back for him, but you're more important right now."
"But he's important to me," she protests weakly.
She can feel hot tears streaking down her face, burning her eyes. She forces herself to look at the looming figure of her father's building, not wanting to see anymore evidence of her wrongdoing. "The reactor exploded," she breathes, her throat very dry.
"Yeah, Avalanche," Reno replies, picking up speed as they loop around onto the highway, away from the residential area. "We got 'em on camera."
"Reno," Tseng mutters, cutting his fellow Turk off immediately.
Charlie holds up her hands, palms up. They're bleeding from digging through all the debris, bright red, and somehow her engagement ring is still intact, if not a little dusty. "I left people to die," she whispers, her voice shaky. "They were in their homes, screaming for help—"
"You can't help everyone," Reno interrupts, firm, not a shred of humor in his voice. It's discomforting to hear him sound so serious. "You did what you could."
"It wasn't enough."
"The people are not your responsibility," Tseng continues, squeezed in between Reno and Charlie, his legs pressed together. "You could have chosen to do nothing, and saved no one in the process. Be thankful you saved some."
They take the private entrance, and when it becomes apparent to Reno that Charlie isn't going to get out of the truck by herself, he has to call for some medics to retrieve her, strapping her onto a stretcher and carrying her through a back door to an elevator that takes them up to the medical bay, reserved typically for infantrymen or SOLDIERs, and sometimes the Turks after particularly gruesome beatings.
She sees herself for the first time in the reflection of the glass elevator, illuminating the still raging, massive fire in the distance, brightening the smoking reactor in all of its glory.
It's not a pretty sight, and it makes Charlie want to cry.
Her light blonde hair hangs lank and sweat-soaked on either side of her face, a cut above her left eyebrow and dried blood covering her upper lip and chin that had drained from her nose. Her cheeks are black, soot covering her fair skin, blackening the tip of her pointed nose. Much of her right side is burned, skin showing through holes in her dress, flesh pink.
The left sleeve of her dress is hanging loose off her arm, her chest bruised and adorned with shallow little cuts. Her organs hurt, like someone has delivered a series of forceful punches to her torso with incredible strength, and moving has become too much of a chore, too painful.
Reno is quiet as he watches the scene unfold in Sectors One and Eight, emergency services slow to put out the fires, but search and rescue is doing their job, flying low helicopters over the rooftops of burning buildings.
When the elevator dings, a few floors below the medical bay, Reno leaves the elevator, but Tseng remains.
She closes her eyes, exhaling softly.
It wasn't supposed to be like this.
He doesn't really know how to feel upon walking into the medical bay. He doesn't really feel at all when he walks into the medical bay.
The back of the long hospital room has been hidden with a long partition, to give Charlotte more privacy, and the lights have been dimmed. The three medics fussing over his injuries lead him towards the back, as well, but upon looking down into her hospital bed, desperate to see her alive and well, his stomach threatens to expel everything all at once, everything he's been holding back over the last few hours, helping with last-minute evacuations.
Tseng lifts his eyes from a yellow-tinted document in his hands, seated in a wooden chair at Charlie's side, fixing Reeve with a very intense gaze for a few seconds before looking away again.
It's odd seeing Charlie wearing something so simple. The hospital has given her a fresh outfit, a white cotton t-shirt and cotton shorts. Lying on her right side, fast asleep, her t-shirt is pulled up slightly so as not to cover the angry burns on her side, and the cuts on her face and chest seem to have been attended to, her skin washed clean of blood and dirt and dust, and her hair brushed. A blanket is tossed over her thighs and legs, tangled up around her.
But she's not alone in her bed.
Lying on his back, Rufus takes up a little more than half of the hospital bed, one of his arms tucked behind his head as he sleeps, ankles crossed, shoes still on, and his other arm wrapped around Charlie, who's sleeping against her brother's chest, curled up at his side like she so often curls up at Reeve's side.
With Tseng sitting there, silent and stoic and seemingly at ease despite all the destruction and terror that's just taken place, Reeve can only assume he was the one to call Rufus, to let him know that Charlie had been injured, had almost been . . . killed.
Even with her eyes closed, he can tell that she's been crying, and when she breathes through her nose, she sounds congested.
And she's wearing her ring. She never wears her ring while she's sleeping.
On one hand, Reeve is astounded that he's being allowed to bear witness to something so . . . vulnerable, and slightly sad. It makes Charlie look so innocent, playing the dutiful role of 'little' sister to her brother, who has always seen it as his duty to protect and care for her, despite her being the first born. He doesn't really think he's ever seen the two of them sharing a sweet moment without being pushed away by Rufus seconds afterwards.
To see Rufus Shinra sleeping so peacefully beside his own sister, to see him openly love something, to openly show affection for someone without being bitter about it is almost touching—almost.
Reeve knows better than that, of course. He knows that this is likely not a touching and innocent moment for Rufus, but a moment of subtle accomplishment and triumph and victory, having reached Charlie's side before her own fiancé and now rubbing it right in his face.
He knows President Shinra would likely die of a heart attack if he knew Rufus was here now, sharing a bed with Charlie. When she had been sixteen, President Shinra had abruptly sent Rufus to Costa del Sol with a Turk for three long weeks after catching his son and daughter sleeping in the same bed one night.
Charlie had screamed at her father to bring Rufus back until she was red in the face and sobbing, and President Shinra had made some cruel remarks that seemed to imply something less than savory brewing between his two children.
Charlie had claimed it was all innocent, that they had only been sleeping, and hadn't seemed to realize that there was anything odd about it, hadn't seemed to understand that it was unnatural for children past puberty to share a bed. Even now, at twenty-six, there are still moments when Reeve catches her seemingly regressing, falling back into these old and toxic habits developed after years of being isolated from other children with only Rufus as company.
Another reason he would prefer to keep Rufus a world away from Charlie.
"Here, Director, have a seat."
He can't speak. His throat burns from shouting and inhaling all of the smoke, each breath coming with a loud wheeze. Everything seems to hurt, and his leg aches so badly that he can hardly put pressure on it any longer.
He still can't believe how quickly it had all happened. One moment he had been leaning in to kiss Charlie, and the next moment he was lying flat on his back, staring up into her bleeding face as flames roared all around them.
If he had been given time to process everything, he isn't certain that he would have been able to stay behind. Seeing all of those people littering the street—dead bodies and bodies on fire, the screeching, the screaming, the horror, and the anxiety of wondering if Charlie was going to make it back to him.
Half of Sector Eight (and Sector One, as far as he's aware) had been reduced to almost nothing within mere seconds, or minutes, however long he had been knocked out among the remains of the restaurant. Half of two sectors reduced to ruins and ashes because of his machine, blown from the inside and cutting power to most homes and businesses.
He had tried to count how many people, but it was unbearable. Hundreds—hundreds died tonight, and surely more will continue to die tomorrow and the next day from injuries sustained, from possible mako poisoning.
But Charlie hadn't been one of them. Despite the fact that she's sleeping sweetly beside her brother, Reeve has to be grateful that she's alive, that she's relatively well, that she hadn't been killed in the explosion his reactor caused.
"Let her sleep," one woman insists, pulling the curtain around Charlie's bed to hide her from view, despite Reeve only having been looking at them, not bothering them in the slightest. "It took hours to calm her."
They work quietly on him, attending to several injuries he hadn't realized were affecting him. While being bandaged up, he hears Charlie stir, so softly, whimpering in a raspy voice that sounds slightly muffled.
She's crying, and he wants so badly to reach out to her, to say something, but he doesn't have the energy, can't find the strength to pull the curtain back and look her in the eyes after what's happened.
"Don't cry, sweet sister," comes Rufus's whisper, and Reeve can hear him place a kiss somewhere on Charlie's face, "it's all right now. I'm here."
There's the shifting of someone on the bed, and the soft sound of Charlie's breathing as she falls back asleep.
Dawn is breaking when he's left alone, wearing fresh clothing not unlike Charlie's and lying back on the generic hospital pillow that offers less than half the comfort that sleeping with Charlotte brings him. Twice he's tempted to wake her, to coerce her into bed with him instead of with her brother, but he doesn't want to wake her and cause her to cry again.
He rubs his temples, his head pounding. He drinks nearly the entire pitcher of water on the nightstand beside his bed, extending his limbs to look at the damage that's been done.
His leg is wrapped with slightly blood-stained bandages, and his knuckles are scraped and bleeding, his palms sore from lifting, digging, and bracing himself.
The explosion is going to cost his department and the company hundreds of thousands of gil, if not millions. They'll need to put money up for replacement services for the victims who now have nowhere left to go (and who are still lingering in the lobby many floors below them), the rebuilding of damaged property, the rebuilding of the reactor. President Shinra will want to raise mako prices, he's sure, and that certainly won't go over well with the people.
That means more long nights trapped in his office, coming home after Charlie is already asleep in bed and leaving for work while she's still in the shower. It means not being able to attend appointments regarding their wedding, both making love to her and whispering sweet promises into her ear within ten minutes, stolen moments between meetings and work their only time together.
It means disappointing her when she wants to go away for a brief vacation. It means disappointing her when she wants to leave work early to see a play, to go out to eat, to sneak home with him and make up for all the time they don't have to spend with each other.
Guilt weighs heavy on his chest, suffocating him. It's crushing, knowing that he hadn't been able to save everyone he came into contact with, knowing that he had left behind people unable to be saved, knowing that the destruction of his own creation had killed hundreds, knowing that he had brought Charlotte into such danger, knowing that she could have been killed in that entire mess and knowing he would have been shot dead if she had been killed.
He closes his eyes, exhausted, but he knows that sleep will not come easily.
Charlie's screen is thrown wide open a few hours after lying awake in complete agony, pain surging through his body and guilt plaguing his mind.
Reeve props himself onto an elbow, either completely unnoticed by President Shinra or completely ignored by him. Regardless, the president's face turns bright red at the sight of Charlie and Rufus embracing in their sleep like twins in the womb, his thick mustache quivering with rage.
"Get away from your sister, boy," President Shinra snaps, waking the both of his children instantly. It takes them a moment to untangle from each other's arms, the both of them unabashed and groggy. "A hundred goddamn beds in this place and you choose the one with your own sister in it."
"Father, giving someone comfort may seem an unfamiliar thing to you," Rufus begins, and Reeve holds his breath, half-afraid that Charlie is going to wake up to her brother being beaten before her very eyes, "but I can assure you—"
"Quiet," President Shinra interrupts him, seething with rage. He doesn't show it very much, but Reeve is all too familiar with that look, the same look that Charlie has when she's furious. "Get out, boy. I'll speak with you later."
Rufus hesitates, perched on the edge of Charlie's bed. He glances quickly at Reeve, his lips curling into a sneer, pressing a kiss to his sister's temple as she blinks a few times, coughing violently and attempting to sit up with Rufus's help.
Her eyes widen at the sight of him. "Reeve!" Her voice is hoarse, hardly there.
He smiles, but says nothing, not wanting to interrupt her father.
President Shinra seems wary of continuing this conversation in front of his daughter's husband-to-be, waiting for Rufus to leave the hospital wing before pressing on, sitting down at the foot of her bed. "How are you both feeling?"
Charlie looks to him, as if hoping for an answer written across his face. When he has no answer to supply her with, she turns back to face her father. "I'm okay, papa."
Is it concern that flickers across her father's face?
"Tseng told me you were in bad shape last night," President Shinra sighs, not even bothering to touch his own daughter, to hug her, to kiss her, after her near-death experience. "You look much better than I imagined you would." Without saying so much as a simple word of caring, he gets back to his feet and looks at the both of them. "I need to see the both of you, separately, when you're feeling better."
The moment her father leaves the hospital ward, Charlie climbs awkwardly out of bed before Reeve gets a chance to do the same, clambering into his own and sighing, partially smothering him as she kisses his face with the softest kisses she can manage.
"I'm so angry with you," she breathes in between kisses, gasping in pain when he touches her side, smiling when he murmurs an apology.
"Why?" he asks, heart racing.
Charlie holds herself above him, one hand on either side of his waist, the ends of her hair tickling his cheeks. "How could you stay behind like that? I was worried sick."
At this confession, Reeve offers her a relieved little smile. "I'm sorry that our night out was so . . . disastrous."
She shakes her head, tears springing to her swollen eyes. "You think I care about that? You think you owe me an apology for what happened?" Kissing him again tearfully, on both of his cheeks, she whispers, "I thought you were dead. I begged them to turn around and go back for you—"
"It doesn't matter. I'm all right."
It's the furthest thing from the truth, but right now, despite everything, he thinks he might be slightly okay. With Charlie beside him, hovering over him, kissing him like she hasn't seen him for months, it's getting better, his mind not quite as cloudy, a weight lifting off his shoulders to ease the pressure on his chest.
"My hero," she rasps, settling back down beside him and curling up against him, just as she had with Rufus. She drapes an arm over his stomach, the bed a little small for the both of them.
"I'm not a hero," he tells her, pulling her close to tuck her right in the crook of his arm. "I did what anyone would have done in my position."
"No," she says. "Not anyone." Charlie raises herself to look down into his face again. "I love you."
She's right, of course. Not everyone from Shinra Inc. would willingly stay behind after a surprise bombing to help pull innocent civilians from underneath the rubble of their homes, from out of crushed cars, from roasting to death upon the flames. If he had to guess, the amount of people in his position that would have done the same could be counted on one hand, and Charlie would be one of those people.
He supposes that's one of the reasons he loves her so much.
And he also supposes, maybe, that's why she loves him.