"Oh, thank the Gods, you're here."
It's not a sentence he ever expected to hear from the vice president's mouth, but he's too exhausted to even look surprised. Getting to his feet from the chair at Charlie's bedside, he waits for Rufus to approach.
"Is she all right? Tseng told me what happened."
"They were able to cure most of the physical damage," Reeve replies, gently turning over Charlie's left hand to show her brother the blistered skin on her palms. "But they had to give her a sedative to get her to sleep."
Rufus chuckles darkly. "They had to give her one the night of the first bombing, as well."
Reeve turns to face him, wondering why now, of all times, he's forced to face the vice president. "Where have you been?" he asks, perhaps too harshly, but Rufus keeps a cool expression on his face. "Why didn't you answer any of Charlie's calls?"
"I heard what happened. Tseng told me," Rufus answers. "Father held you hostage, didn't he?" When Reeve fails to reply, his pride too damaged still, his silence seems answer enough. "It won't be the last time, you know. Now that he knows what her weakness is, he'll continue to exploit that for as long as he can. She'll have no choice but to follow orders so long as you're around."
"I know what you're doing," Reeve says through gritted teeth. Leave it to Rufus to needle and provoke him while they're standing over Charlie's sleeping figure. "If you think that's going to make me walk away—"
"You moron," Rufus hisses, anger flashing in his eyes. "I'm trying to save your life. Do you think Charlie would ever forgive me if I let something happen to you?" He scoffs, his lip curling. "You think I don't know what I'm saying? Father has threatened his own daughter more times that I can count, when I refused to do what he wanted. Not that it mattered. Not a single Turk that's been part of our lives would have ever laid a finger on her, at my command."
"You think by sending me away, you'll be saving my life?" The idea makes him angry. Rufus isn't kind, nor is he sentimental or compassionate. He's manipulative, cruel, possessive, and Reeve is certain that none of this has anything to do with saving his life. "Ask her SOLDIER how that worked out."
"I didn't send her SOLDIER away," Rufus says quickly, too quickly to be a lie. He almost sounds offended. "That was Lazard's doing, when it became clear Charlie was becoming a distraction." He thinks for a moment, reaching down to adjust his sister's blanket. "The journalist, though. I did have him killed."
"On what grounds?"
Rufus smiles. "Nervous?" he asks mockingly. "I had the actor shot, too. You can thank Reno for that nasty bit of business. But don't worry. You're too important to have killed. It's a bit late for that, don't you think, brother?"
Reeve is quiet, unwilling to pull his gaze away from Charlie's peaceful-looking face. He doesn't have the strength to continue arguing with Rufus, who will never back down. It's all to get a rise out of him, to see a show of anger, of jealousy, of protectiveness. Giving Rufus what he wants would only serve to make things worse, to feed into his ego.
"If I really wanted you killed, I would have done it the morning after you raped my sister."
This casual accusation knocks the breath out of Reeve all at once, his face coloring painfully. "I can assure you, that's not what happened."
Rufus smiles, crossing his arms over his chest. "Don't look so guilty, Director. Better you than someone else from the company." Turning to face Reeve, he continues, business-like. "Anyway, I wouldn't worry too much about my father. Tell her to call me, when she wakes. I'll be around."
Reeve watches him go, sighing. Rufus is definitely up to something, but he has far bigger priorities now—Charlie, for one, and the aftermath of the now collapsed plate.
The unexpected demolition of his building had surprised him, but he hadn't been truly worried until Tseng reported finding Charlie by the flaming wreckage.
The damage survey is still being calculated. Shinra hadn't bothered to dispatch anyone to the non-existent slum beneath Sector Seven, but Reeve can see the helicopters scouring the ruins of the top-side, hardly anything there.
More than half the plate is completely gone, having crashed down three hundred meters to the browned earth, and the only part that remains relatively intact is the part closest to Sector Zero, where the remaining two pillars stand precariously, causing tremors to ripple through the remainder of the sector and affecting the buildings that have yet to be razed to the ground.
It's an impossible task. He'll never be able to secure the funding (just like Sector Six . . . how long has it been now?), and no amount of rebuilding will make up for the hundreds of thousands of lives taken tonight.
He wants to leave, to pack Charlie up and take her far away from the influence of her family. How can he possibly continue to work for a corporation that has sucked the life from him, the joy and passion? A company that is unafraid to exterminate an entire sector in the hopes of killing off a mere handful of eco-terrorists?
Reeve would have to hide them well. Surely the Turks would be the first dispatched, with the goal of finding them (possibly eliminating him altogether while dragging Charlie back to Midgar). He doesn't even know where he would take her, isn't aware of any places far enough removed from Shinra's rule that he would consider truly safe for them.
And if he does leave, what power will either of them have? Once their money is used up on travel and supplies and a new home, they'll have nothing. He supposes the both of them could find work easily with their many talents, but who would want to hire the disgraced daughter of President Shinra and her doormat fiancé?
Why hadn't he demanded President Shinra call it off? Why didn't he continue to fight until he was killed for disloyalty and insolence? Why didn't he try and stop it (how would he have?) or make for either above or below the plate to insist upon immediate evacuations? Why had he left that duty to Charlie, when he was there, right there, watching the plate fall from his office window?
There's so much more he could have done, if he wasn't a coward. He'll never be the hero Charlie thinks he is, and tonight has made that fact very clear to him.
But if he leaves now, how could he help? At least here, at Shinra, he still has some power afforded him, the power to do some good in the world and make people's lives slightly easier. Running away would mean turning his back, not only on Shinra, but on the people of Midgar, his home.
Work is the last thing he wants to do now. His mind is buzzing with thoughts of Charlie, thoughts of what may come next after such a disaster, the helplessness that plagues him, unable to do anything for her, for the people, for the city.
He picks up one of the photographs on his desk, one of him and Charlie at a fundraiser. She's beaming up at him, an arm around his waist and her eyes closed as he kisses the tip of her nose. The tuxedo she had urged him to wear was stiff and uncomfortable, the bow tie tight and rubbing awkwardly at his Adam's apple, but Charlie had been thrilled to see him so dressed up, and he would do it again to see her smile like that.
She hasn't been herself lately. Ever since coming back from Rocket Town, it seems as if there's a fire beneath her feet, igniting the passion she lost after the failure of her rocket launch. She's become more defiant, more rebellious, not that she's never been that way.
Reeve can't quite put his finger on it, but what he thought to just be the symptoms of her concussion seem to be something greater, a desire burning within her to . . . to do what?
Running to the Sector Seven slums was foolish, there's no denying it.
But at least she had the courage to go through with it.
"Ugh . . ."
Charlie's eyes flutter open. The sun is setting over Midgar through the tall windows, changing the color of the white sheet thrown over her to a dark orange.
"Well, well, well. You've been sleepin' for a long time."
Her neck snaps with the force that she turns to look left. There's no mistaking the bright red hair, the nasally voice. "Reno!" she gasps, looking him over.
He doesn't look good. His face is swollen and bruised, his bottom lip split and his nose broken, skin covered with a myriad of bandages. "Why don't you take a picture?" he snaps, looking up at the ceiling.
Charlie takes a quick look around while he sulks in the bed beside her. It's a minute before she remembers how she had gotten here, still feeling a bit groggy. It's probably the sedative wearing off, the one they had injected straight into her arm without warning.
In the doctor's defense, she was a little hysterical.
She sits up quickly upon remembering the events before that. The building had exploded and knocked Charlie out. The next time she had opened her eyes, it was to find Tseng looking down at her, and then after another short while, she had opened them once more to find herself being rolled into the medical bay, confused and frightened.
"Reno, the plate—"
He looks at her very seriously, his lips pursed tight, and then he shakes his head.
Charlie falters, unable to find words to express how she's feeling—horror, grief, guilt, anger, despair. Part of her is glad she hasn't seen it, not wanting to relive it over and over again in her sleep, but another part of her thinks she really deserved that salt in her wound. She should have been forced to look at what her actions have caused.
"Where's Reeve?" she asks shrilly.
"I'm fine, thanks for asking," Reno scoffs.
"Why are you being such a jerk?" Charlie hisses at him, watching his mouth curl into a scowl. "Where's Reeve?"
"Don't worry, he's been coming every hour, on the hour." Reno rolls over onto his side, grunting and moaning in pain, before propping himself on an elbow to look at her. "I'm getting sick of lookin' at him."
"Be nice to him, Reno," she scolds him, earning herself another scoff. "What happened to you?"
"Why do you care? Worried 'bout me, princess?"
Charlie looks him over warily. She doesn't know what to say. "Who did that to you?"
"Avalanche. Tried to stop the plate dropping, didn't they?"
"I don't know. I wasn't there. What happened to them? Did you drop the plate?"
Reno frowns. She can't really be mad at him. The order never came from his mouth, and he had only been a good and loyal employee. It's not like Reno would disobey a direct order. "What are you asking so many goddamn questions for, Charlie?"
"You can't talk to me like that." She looks around the large room again, the beds all empty save for the two of them. "Where's Tseng?"
"Tseng, Tseng, Tseng," Reno drawls, falling onto his back again. "I dunno, Charlie. He came back to HQ with that Ancient last night—"
"What? No, he didn't," Charlie tells him. "He came back here with me."
"Yeah, and the Ancient."
"What Ancient?"
"The one from Sector Five."
Charlie purses her lips. She isn't quite sure who he's referring to, and she doesn't remember anyone else being aboard the helicopter with her and Tseng, but she doesn't remember the helicopter ride, either.
"Where's my phone? I need to talk to him," she says, mostly to herself. She looks around, but her phone is nowhere to be seen. The only thing on her small nightstand is a fluorescent lamp that gives her a headache.
"Probably crushed beneath the Sector Seven plate."
She growls through gritted teeth. "Where's my gun?"
"The hell do you need a gun for?" Reno pushes himself into a sitting position. "Who gave you a gun?"
"Rufus did—"
"Of course he did. You're gonna hurt someone with that thing—"
"Oh, you're one to talk," she snaps back, "after what you did last night. Sleep well with that weighing on your non-existent conscience?"
"Yeah, like a baby." There's something bitter about the way he says it.
"Gods, you're the worst," she continues, unable to stop herself. It feels good to unleash on someone, someone who's more than willing to fight back, to remind her that she isn't innocent. "I don't even know why I bother with you. You're such a rat. All you Turks are the same—"
"Don't pretend you hate us now," Reno spits, anger written across his puffy face. It's discomforting to see him this way, but Charlie can't stop now. She needs him to know that what he did was wrong, if her assumptions are correct. "Besides, if you hated us Turks so much, you wouldn't always be asking for Tseng Tseng Tseng. He's our leader, you know, and if any of us are guilty, then it's him."
Charlie clenches her jaw. She doesn't want to think of Tseng as someone who can be cruel and cold when the job demands it, not after the unconditional kindness he's continually shown her since she was a young girl. She knows that he can be friendly and funny, patient and loyal.
And yet he had kidnapped a girl last night, has overseen the destruction of a few small villages in the past, was involved with shady members of Shinra when he first joined the ranks.
"At least Tseng is respectful," Charlie says after a moment, blushing heatedly. "You lack any grace, Reno."
"I don't give a damn about grace."
"You might, if you knew what it meant."
"Y'know, just because you're a 'genius'—" He holds his hands up to curl his fingers into mocking air quotes—"doesn't mean the rest of us are idiots." She's done it now, she's gone and made him really angry. "You and the director sit up all high and mighty in the penthouse your sugar daddy brother pays for, acting so self-righteous, but you're just as bad as the rest of us, pockets lined with that pretty gold blood money. We're just doin' the dirty work for you so you can keep your hands clean and your pockets full."
"You're such an ass—"
She falls silent at the sound of someone clearing their throat.
Charlie flushes, and evening Reno shifts uncomfortably in bed, his cheeks tinted pink. Tseng watches them carefully, hands held behind his back. "Feeling any better, Reno?"
"No better than I look, Boss, but thanks for caring more than Charlie."
"Where's Reeve?" she asks Tseng, hoping to quickly distract him so he doesn't bring up whatever he heard her say just now. "And where's my phone?"
"The director is currently in his office, already drawing up plans for the reconstruction of Sector Seven. An emergency board meeting has recently been called," Tseng answers immediately. "And your phone was missing when I lifted you into the helicopter. I'll have a new one issued for you the moment I'm able."
Charlie groans, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Yeah, a bugged phone, no doubt."
"Your father, the president, has requested to see you, Charlotte," Tseng says again, ignoring her last comment completely. Charlie lowers the hand on her face to look up at him once more. "When you're feeling able, of course."
"No way!" she hisses, keeping her voice down. "Like I'm going to go up there and allow him to beat me—"
Tseng holds up a hand to stop her. "That's not his intention. He simply has a favor to ask of you."
"A favor? From me? What is it?"
He glances quickly at Reno, who scoffs again and rolls over to put his back to both Charlie and Tseng. "Come with me," Tseng insists, holding out a hand for her, "if you're feeling all right."
Curious, Charlie throws the blankets off her legs and goes with him, walking through the semi-empty hallways of Shinra Headquarters. Most of the people who are still working are locked away in conference rooms and offices, trying to figure out a way to save the city from drowning in debt after the destruction caused by the dropping of the plate.
She still can't believe it, but she refuses to look out any of the windows they pass, afraid to see that it's true.
"Where's Rufus? Does he know about this?" Charlie asks as they enter the glass elevator that will take them straight to her father's office. She keeps her eyes trained on the door, despite how badly she wants to turn around and see the consequences of her actions.
"The vice president is in the city," he says. "When your father is finished talking to you, I will bring you to him."
"No, I want to see Reeve first."
"The director is very busy, Charlotte. I'll bring you to your brother, but I'll let Reeve know that you asked for him."
It's quiet for a moment between them. It bothers Charlie that Tseng can continue to act so cool and aloof, even after what had just happened. "You kidnapped a girl," she whispers, afraid that someone might hear the weakness in her voice. "Reno told me. You kidnapped an Ancient."
Tseng looks thoroughly annoyed by this information, but forces himself to smile at her. "The girl came of her own accord," he replies flatly. "Besides, she couldn't do what she was told."
"Which was?"
This time, the smile on his face seems a bit more genuine when Charlie lifts her eyes to look into his face. "She was incapable of following an order, one that instructed her to remain at home. Instead, I found her in the Sector Seven slums."
Charlie purses her lips. "Did Rufus know about this?"
"No," he answers firmly. "I can assure you, Charlotte, your brother's hands are entirely clean of the situation."
She falls quiet again, just for a few seconds. "The other night, the bombing of mako reactor five . . ." she begins, blushing. "Did you watch?"
"I did."
"That man had Angeal's sword."
"It certainly seemed so."
Upon entering the president's office, Tseng lingers by the doors as Charlie wanders around, the office completely empty save for the two of them. "Where's my father?" she snaps, irritated by the long walk to an empty office, irritated with Tseng and her father and especially Reno. "Is he supposed to be here?"
"He will be, at the conclusion of the board meeting. Wait here, and don't go anywhere."
Charlie turns around to face the doors again, only to find that Tseng is slowly closing them, hardly abashed. She sprints to him, reaching him just as the doors slam shut, hearing the outside lock click! shut.
Infuriated and humiliated, she pounds on the doors with her fists, screaming at him, unsure if he's even standing out there, listening. "What are you doing! Let me out!"
"It will only be for a little while, as you wait for the president," comes Tseng's muffled voice.
"Tseng! Let me out now!" She bangs a few more times on the door, her heart racing. "Let me out or I'll tell Rufus what you did! I'll tell him you touched me! I'll have him kill you!" When Tseng fails to answer her, she sighs, resting her forehead against the door and closing her eyes. "Please, Tseng, let me out . . . please, it's me, it's Charlotte, please . . . open the door, Tseng, for me . . . I'll do anything you ask of me, please . . ."
He must have left her, because certainly he would have at least answered such a desperate plea. Then again, if Rufus had been immune to her girlish charm over the many voicemails she'd left him, then maybe Tseng has grown past that, as well.
"I hate you!" she continues, feeling tears budding in her eyes. If she turns around, if she looks through the windows that line her father's office, she'll have to look at Sector Seven. "I hate you! I wish I'd never met you!"
Whirling around, her chest heaving, Charlie makes for her father's phone, immediately dialing the extension to Reeve's assistant, glad to hear her pick up after the second ring.
"Thank you for calling the Shinra Electric Power Company's Urban Development Department. You've reached the office of Director Reeve Tues—"
"It's Charlotte. Put Reeve on the phone right now."
"I—I'm sorry, ma'am, but the director is currently in a board meeting—"
Charlie slams the phone back down, hanging up violently. Steeling herself for the worst, she takes a few steps past her father's desk, stepping up to the window to look out upon the darkened city.
There's a gaping hole where Sector Seven had been. No power is left, no pretty lights illuminating the cityscape. The plate is gone, save for a small section near Headquarters, and all the buildings and lives that have gone down with it . . .
From seventy floors up, it's difficult to discern what's really going on down there, but it's a completely different scene from the reactor bombings. Crisis management seems slow and scattered, and there are significantly less helicopters circling the rubble than she might have dispatched.
Perhaps her father had realized that not many people would have survived the plate drop compared to the amount of survivors that made it through the bombing.
Charlie takes a few steps backwards, her stomach churning.
What will Reeve think? What would he say if she told him this was all her fault? What would he say if she told him the complete truth? Could he even look her in the eyes again after that? How could he ever want to marry someone with so much blood on their hands?
Would it be too much to ask for some time before confessing? Would it be asking too much to want to be held by him once more, to be kissed and loved once more, to wake up beside him just one more time?
She's kept waiting for at least an hour. When the doors to President Shinra's office finally open again, Charlie is almost disappointed that it isn't Tseng or Rufus or Reeve, someone to get her out of here and avoid her father altogether.
He hardly acknowledges her, walking right to his desk to sit down heavily in his chair, opening a desk drawer to pull out a fresh cigar. He sniffs at it critically before flicking a metal lighting against his thick thumb, puffing at his cigar while it lights. It's a horrible process to witness.
"Let's talk, Char," he says after a moment, groaning in relief as he leans back in his chair, looking exhausted.
She has not a shred of sympathy for him. He doesn't even have the decency to ask if she's all right, to ask why she had gone down into the slums. He doesn't bring up their conversation, doesn't want to acknowledge the fact that he would have killed his own daughter to make a damn point to a small group of terrorists.
It's the straw that breaks her back.
"You want to talk?" Charlie stands opposite her father, her palms splayed across the cool desktop. "I have several things I'd like to say to you, you—"
"Go on, then. Get it over with."
She blinks in surprise at him. Despite her not having begun yet, President Shinra already seems exasperated. No doubt he's already well aware of all the things his daughter wants to say, but she's going to say them anyway.
"How could you do that?" she shrieks, hoping that the entirety of her father's security detail can hear her. She wants the entire building to hear her, the entire city, the entire world. "You killed all those people and you don't even care! You would have killed me and you wouldn't even have batted an eye! Do you understand how insane you have to be to do something so—"
"Ah, Shinra didn't cause the Sector Seven plate to fall," President Shinra interrupts her, smiling faintly. "Avalanche did, Char."
"Avalanche," Charlie repeats, laughing weakly. "You are unbelievable." She straightens, crossing her arms over her chest, in complete disbelief. It shouldn't come as a surprise. She's always known that her father is cold and cruel. "Don't you care? Don't you feel a shred of remorse for what you've done?"
President Shinra looks at his daughter for a long time. He's not going to bring up his own feelings (if he even has any). "I need a favor from you, Char."
"Like I would do anything for you after you had a gun held to Reeve's head," she retorts, offended that he would ask for even a simple favor. "If you want me to do something for you, you can just skip to having me killed next time, and leave him out of it."
"Don't worry. The favor I need is not one that you'll inherently dislike, I think," he continues, standing up. His chair creaks and groans, likely relieved that it's not suffering under her father's weight anymore. "In fact, I cannot think of anyone more suited to such a task. Who would have thought that your charm would one day come in handy?"
"I'm sorry?"
"Have you ever heard stories of the Promised Land?"
She thinks for a moment, unable to tell what her father is thinking. "It's a fairytale. Veld used to read me stories like that." Charlie takes a certain pleasure in the fact that it must burn her father up inside to know this Turk he hated so much was more of a father to her than any other man in her life.
"It's no fairytale," President Shinra continues, scowling at the mention of Veld, and blowing his cigar smoke in Charlie's face. "The Promised Land is real, a land of untapped resources, a land of infinite mako energy."
She frowns. "'We who are born of the planet, with her we speak. Her flesh we shape. Unto her promised land shall we one day return. By her loving grace and providence may we take our place in paradise.'"
Her father smiles tersely. "I see you've been taking advantage of the theater we've put in."
"Mother used to read that poem." She knows it's unwise to mention their mother, but if it displeases her father, he does well hiding it behind a cold mask of determination. "Where is it, then?"
"Only an Ancient can lead us to their Promised Land," he says gruffly, "and as it happens, we currently have the last surviving Ancient in our custody."
Charlie's heart beats a little faster. "The girl that Tseng kidnapped . . ."
"Yes, the girl that Tseng kidnapped is an Ancient, the last of her race, and very important in regards to this company's prosperity. She will lead us to the Promised Land, with your help, of course, my girl." He begins to pace in front of her, allowing Charlie a moment to think. "She's currently being held on the sixty-ninth floor, in Professor Hojo's lab. He has assured me, only recently, that her cooperation is guaranteed, and who better to first attempt the extracting of such information than . . . you?"
"You want me to torture her?"
"Torture? Dear girl, now really!" President Shinra tilts his head back and laughs loudly. Leave it to her father to laugh at something that's not even a joke. "Is that the first place your mind goes? No, no . . . you're too soft-hearted, what with your woman's heart. You're the very last person I would ask for something of that nature. Your Turks, on the other hand . . ."
"I don't want to hear anymore," she says suddenly, afraid that her father will only continue to tell her things about the Turks that will taint her image of them. "Why should I do anything for you? How do I know that, if I refuse, you won't hold Reeve hostage again?"
"You want something in return, is that it? Certainly you do, if you're any spawn of mine," he chortles, pressing his lit cigar against the ashtray, the ends splitting with the force of the pressure he puts on it. "Fine. If you're able to extract the information we need from her, I'll give you your old department back. Would that make you happy?"
"I don't want to be Director of Communications anymore."
"No, not that. Your other department."
Charlie's heart leaps in her throat. It's something she's dreamed of for nearly five years now, wanted it more than she's wanted anything, even the vice presidency. "The Space Exploration Department?"
"I'm certain I can find another job for Palmer within the company . . . one that requires less thinking on his end, and less doing. I will not deny that you are certainly more capable. But don't think that means I'm prepared to refund the department. With the Promised Land within our reach yet again . . ." He turns to look out the window, and she's sure that he's hiding a smile from her. "There will be no need for space travel, not with an unlimited supply of mako running beneath our very feet."
He'll give you a title to appease you, nothing more, she thinks. There will be no power, no projects, only a salary and an empty title.
She wants it bad. She wants to start on a new rocket, with Captain Cid Highwind at her side, going through the motions with her. But even if she does as her father says, it's unlikely she'll ever even get that far, and President Shinra (and Rufus, she supposes, as well) would never allow Cid within fifty miles of whatever project Charlie takes up.
Charlie knows it will likely be impossible to help the girl. If she's being held in Hojo's lab (she's hesitant to even walk into the lab without someone at her side), then she knows that she won't be entirely alone. There will be cameras, and if she wants to break her out of wherever she's being kept, Charlie will need a key or a passcode or general knowledge of Hojo's experimental devices that she knows nothing about.
What's so bad about finding the Promised Land anyway? Unlimited mako . . . if that's true, why wouldn't someone see fit to use it?
Mako has made peoples' lives infinitely better, providing them with power and comfort, working the engines in their cars and helicopters and airships and boats, powering the theaters and restaurants people visit to escape reality. If it truly was an infinite supply, the world would thrive.
What would it do to the planet, to use so much mako?
The reactors in Midgar alone have sucked the very life from the surrounding earth, leaving only an ugly reminder of what happens when a corporation becomes too greedy, when the people become complacent with their comfortable lives.
"Okay," she rasps, against all of her better judgement. "Okay, I'll talk to her."
President Shinra turns around quickly, perhaps surprised at her agreement, but before he's able to say anything, someone knocks on the door three times in quick succession. "Who is it?" he booms.
The door cracks open just a sliver, so their visitor can be heard. "It's Tseng, sir, with an urgent message."
"Urgent, you say?" Her father picks up his cigar again, putting it to his lips, but not yet lighting it. "Go on, then, son. Come in, come in. I was just having a healthy little chat with Char. You'll be pleased to know she's agreed to speak to the Ancient."
"Very good, sir." Tseng glances sideways at Charlie as he walks up to her side, standing at the front of President Shinra's desk. "We've captured some intruders, Mr. President."
President Shinra's cigar falls from his lips and his face turns bright red. "Intruders? Who are these criminals?"
"Avalanche, sir, and . . ." He clears his throat. "The Ancient. All of them are currently in custody while I await your next order."
"How did they get in?"
"The emergency stairwell, it seems, Mr. President. They came for the Ancient."
President Shinra growls, his mustache twitching. Leaving his cigar lying on the floor, he turns to his daughter. "Stay here, Char, so we can discuss the next steps. I need to see this with my own eyes first, since Shinra's Turks are clearly incapable of detecting trouble before it runs up the emergency stairwell."
Tseng averts his eyes, the back of his neck growing slightly red. Charlie almost feels bad for him, but after a moment, the feeling fades. She's been the subject of her father's insults for years, and it's nice to see someone else on the receiving end.
"Show me to their cells," President Shinra tells Tseng, who nods. "You best be here when I return, Char."
She sighs. "Yes, Father."