Danny stared at her.

Marin's words came out in a torrent of run-on sentences. "Your parents said you ran away. Jamie and I never believed them." she sucked in a breath, trying to calm herself down.

Danny held out a hand, "slow down, you're going too fast."

Marin took the hand in both of hers. "Your parents said you'd run away."

Danny snorted, "Of course they did."

"Jamie and I didn't believe them. But then.."

"Did you see my body?"

She shook her head. "they said it was a closed coffin because of the state-" she choked again. "...Because of how you were found."

A week before the funeral, Danny had come out to his family as gay, he had told Jamie and Marin he would. His family had thrown him out on the street. Hence Marin's disbelief that he had merely run off.

Marin and Jamie had warned him against it. Their plan was to become so independent from their families that it wouldn't matter if anyone found out. Marin still wasn't sure what she was, but she knew how she felt about Jamie and how Jamie felt about her. That was enough for both of them.

Whatever had happened to Danny, his body was too far gone to tell if he had died that night or the next day or the night after that. His family had had the funeral as soon as they could manage.

"The last thing you told me, over the phone" Marin kept herself together, "Was that you were gonna try to figure out the night. Before you would ask us for help." she had never had a chance to ask her parents if her best friend could crash on their couch. She had never had a chance to try.

"I remember." Danny shrugged, "I don't remember dying though." He shrugged, "That might make going back home complicated."

Marin shook her head, "Who knows. Maybe we're all dead. Maybe this is all a dream before we actually die. Or maybe we go back right before we die and we maybe don't die?"

"I like the last one."

Marin shrugged, "On the bright side to going back before we left. If that happens, I'll already have a therapist to work through whatever else happens here."

"Already? Are you OK Marin?"

"No." she hugged herself. "But what choice do I have now? It's sink or swim. And by sink I mean die on an alien world. Who knows what happens then?" She thought of Ardyn, but to much of what had been said was no longer fresh after seeing Danny.

"Marin..."

She shook her head. "It's a long story. And It sounds like we both have a long day tomorrow."

"Marin. Please, you said you were in the hospital?"

She shook her head. "I was already not doing so well before-" she cut herself off.

"I remember. You were so upset when you told me the wait list for a psychiatrist or therapist or something. That you were gonna have to wait a year to see somebody."

"I managed to go three days, after the funeral, before everything fell apart." she looked down at the floor. "I don't want to talk about it." Danny hadn't been there, he hadn't seen what had happened. What Marin's fugue had taken from her memory. He didn't always go to those meet ups at the restaurant. But if he had lived, he would have blown up her phone with missed calls and messages. Ignored, same as Marin had been doing to Jamie.. And she would have been as much a risk to his safety as she was to anybody else. "I'm not safe."

"What? How could you say that? What about Jamie?"

"I haven't see her since before the hospital." She rubbed her arm, still looking at the floor. "I should call her."

"Yeah, maybe." Danny sat on the bed next to her.

"Please, don't touch me."

He sat just far enough that they wouldn't accidentally brush up against each other. He put his arm down, from where he had been about to wrap it around her. "OK."

"I need a hug. But. The first few days I could remember, touching me hurt. How could it hurt?"

"Brains are weird."

"Mines really weird. It always has been."

"I remember you saying, something. I'm sorry. I don't."

Marin shook her head. "I'm not surprised. I didn't have the words to describe it then."

"How about now?"

"I dunno. I was trying to figure that out, and now I'm here." she made a 'come over here' gesture with her fingers.

Danny slid a little closer. "Can I give you a hug?"

"Yeah."

"OK." He gave her a brief squeeze.

"You've known me longer than that." she told him.

He gave her another hug, a longer one this time, before breaking off. "So, how does your brain make you unsafe?"

She shook her head. "I don't remember." she sighed. "I blacked out. Woke up days later, in the hospital, with bruised hands and arms. I had been in a fight." She shrugged again. "Please don't ask me any more about it. I'm still trying to get away from it."

"What did Jamie say?"

Marin shrugged, "Where I went, the only visitor was my mom."

"Yikes."

"Yeah. I haven't seen anyone else since."

"Not anyone?"

She shook her head.

Danny asked "And after the hospital?"

Marin shook her head. "For reasons, the doctors thought I'd be better off staying with my mom after discharge."

"Double yikes."

"I told you she makes a good first impression."

"Yeah, I remember the first time I met your dad. He was scary when he thought I was your boyfriend."

"Haaaa..." Marin's chuckle trailed off.

Danny patted her on the back. "He was half right, just wrong about who you're dating." He grinned widely.

Marin chuckled a little.

Danny elbowed Marin, "Good, you haven't forgotten how to smile."

Marin's smile fell off her face. "I don't know when or if I'm ever going to see Jamie again."

Danny looked at the floor with Marin, they were quiet a for a few moments before he asked her. "You and Jamie made a plan."

"That was then Danny. Who knows now." She shrugged, "Two more friends in a three-bedroom apartment. Jobs, college. We were going to do that. We had this whole thing worked out..."

"Yeah, I remember, you were going to take the first turn working and taking care of the place. House girlfriend?"

"Hah. A house wife? In this economy?" They both laughed.

When the laughter died down, Danny added. "At least here, we don't have to worry about climate change or the apocalypse anymore."

"Ha. Ha..." Marin looked at Danny and she saw his face fill with concern as he watched her face. "About that."

"What?"

"Danny, do you know where we are? What this planet is?"

"Um, yeah. It's from one of your video games. Final Fighting?"

Marin corrected Danny, "Final Fantasy. The seventh one to be specific."

"How many times are they gonna call it final?" Danny mused.

"Fifteen times so far. But the story behind the name doesn't matter right now."

"Yeah, so we're in one of those. And..."

"I've been here a few weeks. I still don't know when."

"You don't know what year it is?"

Marin punched him in the shoulder. "I know when it is, dammit. It's 1998 around here. I don't know when in relation to the game's story."

"How well do you know it?"

"Too well. I've had a lot of time to play this one and a few others lately."

"And yet..."

"And yet I never dug deep enough into the lore to know enough."

"Like what?"

"It's like. I know a bunch of stuff about things. About the order stuff happens in, but not when in relation to today." she hugged herself. "I don't know how long we have until either the world ends on it's own, or a bunch of heroes show up to save it. Er, multiple times."

Danny looked concerned. "What do you mean 'multiple times'?"

Marin licked her lips. "This is the one that has a lot to it..."

"Yeah, the one with the cool motorcycle, and ShinRa. Fuck ShinRa." Danny said that last part with feeling.

"Yeah, that's Seven."

"You said 'save the world multiple times' though?"

Marin nodded. "I guess since you save the world once, the had to tell that sort a story over and over again."

"So, where do we stand right now?"

Marin shrugged. "There is more game to this game than I could possibly know. And..." she faded out dramatically.

"And?"

"What I thought I knew was wrong. Icicle Inn was more like a remote Alps-looking chalet-resort-town. It was more than six buildings in a little two-dimensional background. We're in Kuar-glen right now! And I've never heard of it!" she adjusted her bracelet, the thing was a little loose, the gesture was useless. She pulled out one of her two notebooks. "Look at this!"

He flipped a few pages. "This is chicken scratches. Besides, it's another of your invented alphabets isn't it? I can't read this."

Marin swore. "Oh, yeah. So I learned to write with a keyboard, so sue my penmanship." she flipped through some pages for something written in English characters.

Her hand writing was readable to her, as well as a mix of English, Chinese and French. Whatever words made it shorter. She flipped through pages until she found what she wanted to show Danny.

"With grand-parents like yours. I'm surprised there's no Japanese in here."

Marin shrugged. "They liked to talk without the 'grand-kids' knowing what they were saying. Anyway, this notebook is me scrambling to write down what I can. Since I don't have the game or the Internet to reference anymore."

Danny flipped through a few more pages. "I can read the English, if I stare long enough. But I don't understand your notes." He handed her back her notebook.

Marin shrugged. "It's just how I jog my memory."

"Whatever works. I mean, it's not like the world depends on it or anything."

Marin slapped Danny's arm.

"Owie. I'm gonna tell my mom!" He mocked.

The laughter cut off at the implications to that statement.

After another silence, Marin asked. "And those guys, that you were with?"

Danny brightened. "I remember them, from something you said."

Marin's eyebrows scrunched. "Who?"

"The..." He leaned closer. They were already being quiet, but Danny whispered this part. "The so-called Eco-terrorists that you told me were some of the people that save the world. What were their names again?"

"Barret, Tifa and a few others. But-."

"Yeah, yeah, you know the ones." he leaned close and got even quieter. "I found AVALANCHE." His volume went up to normal again. "What's wrong?"

Marin shook her head, keeping at a whisper. "Did you actually meet Barret or Tifa? Anyone called Biggs, Wedge or Jessie?"

"Nope to all. Does Shears or Elfe ring any bells?"

Marin shook her head. "No, Maybe." Marin couldn't place them. "But AVALANCHE outside of Midgar does..." She trailed off. She knew just enough to feel like she could put Danny in more danger.

"And why is that?"

"Can you keep a secret?" She squeezed her lips shut.

"Yeah."

"Like, if we were beaten half to death. You would keep this to yourself kind of secret." She whispered a little quieter. "Terrorists, Eco or otherwise, tend not to be nice. Neither are their enemies."

"What are you saying Marin? I'm doing this for the planet!"

"I know I don't have the words to debate the ethics of Eco-terrorism. Or the greater good. The needs of the many over the needs of the few-"

"Live long and prosper." He put his hand up in the Star Trek sign of peace and prosperity.

She covered his hand with both of her own. "I'm serious Danny."

"So what's your secret?"

She shrugged, leafing through her notebook. "Like I said, there is a lot to this world." she kept flipping for the page she wanted.

"So far, what I know is right, but this world is so much more than that. Like that old game was a shadow of this. Aha." she found the page she wanted. "But this 'higher-definition' world is still true to what I remember, there's just more of it."

"What are you pointing at?" He leaned forward, clearly finding her writing illegible.

Marin pulled out a pencil. Re-writing the name carefully. Speaking as loudly as she dared. "I know who pays your boss' boss' boss." She wrote out the name 'Rufus ShinRa.' the vice president of ShinRa. 'Or he will be one day.' Marin thought.

The ShinRa Electric Power Company were the unequivocal 'bad guys' of this world. And Rufus was the son of the President. He would be president one day, if he wasn't already. And he was the primary source of income for the biggest anti-corporate Eco-terrorists the world had ever seen. How that AVALANCHE tied into the seventh game's protagonists, Marin did not remember.

"What?" compared to their whispers Danny almost shouted.

Marin clapped a hand to his mouth. "Be quiet!" she hissed.

Danny pulled her hand down and went back to a whisper. "How? How do you know that when You don't even know my boss' names? What if you're wrong?"

Marin shook her head, "I didn't play that game. But I read about it." She kept shaking her head, "I told you there is so much to this world. And I know enough to get into trouble or danger."

"Yeah, I would say! R-" He cut himself off. Even at a whisper, he cut off the name. He continued at a whisper. "So, what about ShinRa?"

"Here." She waved her hand around. "It's so much worse." she pointed to the newspaper on the chair. "Like the war that's been a thing for years? The Wutai I know, that I thought I knew. Had only one town. Some tourist trap. But based on the ShinRa-owned-operated-written and edited newspaper. there's fighting all over the island. The War is going on all over that Island." she shivered. "It is so much worse."

"Does it ever end?"

"What?"

"The War."

Marin shrugged, "I think so? At least there was no fighting that I knew of."

"And only one town..." Danny said.

Marin nodded. "I haven't even begun to pick apart the potential butterfly effect of touching a war. Never mind anything I've already done so far."

Danny leaned back against the wall. Deep in thought.

Marin left him, she skimmed her notes, looking for more gaps to fill. The guy had talked himself into joining what he thought were the good guys. In many ways they were, fighting against a super-monopoly-corporation. which owned almost all the world. All of it once the Wutai war ended. It was worst-case capitalism. They didn't have climate change the same way Earth did. But the energy options ShinRa had made could end the world one day. If the wound in the North pole didn't end everything first.

And now Danny had just found out that the company he had been trying to stop, were the same people that paid him. AVALANCHE were pawns of Rufus, so he could use them against his father to takeover ShinRa. He wasn't president yet. Marin had learned that much. But he was the son of the most powerful man in the world.

And Danny was just a tool for part of ShinRa to use against other parts of ShinRa.

Danny looked at her. "Who knows this?"

Marin shook her head. "I have no idea, other than him." She tapped the name, before erasing Rufus' name. She might need that space for something else later. It was so deep a secret, she didn't want to whisper it aloud.

"It's why I was quite happy to look for a job. Find a place to settle and watch the news. But trouble has a way of just showing up."

"But if you don't know the exact time line, then how would watching the news help?"

She tapped the space that had just held a name, "There are some things that will appear in the news. Or at least won't be a secret."

Danny shook his head, "Wow." He was still processing.

Marin leaned close, so close that it would have been mistaken for flirting if they did not know each other so well. "People would kill to know that. Or kill either of us to keep it unknown."

"So why tell me?" He whispered back.

"Because we're both in over our heads. And I want you to know who you're really working for."

Danny was still in denial, "We're the good guys…"

"I'm not going to debate AVALANCHE's intentions. But you should know-"

"There's rumors of a plan to off the president." He threw his arms out. "I still don't believe it!" He settled back down after nearly clipping Marin's ear. "I don't want to believe it." Danny stared at the wall. "His own son, what a family." He threw his arms out, "I still don't believe it."

Marin looked at him.

He gestured again, "I will, because it's coming from you. I just need time." He shrugged, "I knew there was an informant!" He whispered furiously, "I fucking knew it."

Marin shrugged, "I don't know the nitty-gritty details. But yeah, the guy I named is the 'leak' and the wallet. And your 'friends' are really costing them money and time. Also his pawns."

Danny shrugged again, "I need some time."

Marin nodded and went back to her notebook. She was going to need to re-write it in pen to stop it from smudging. She had heard of exercises for holding onto long-term memories. But she had no idea how to make one, to commit all her notes to memory. She didn't like having an object that could be lost, stolen or damaged. Harold could definitely not read the non-English alphabets in this book. Marin was frustrated, that being a polyglot was otherwise wasted here. The notebook could be just as secure with one of her made-up ciphers. Knowing three languages now felt like a waste of her time.

"Fucking secret wars." She mumbled to herself.

"What?"

"ShinRa and their secrets wars with someone-or-other. Maybe throw a potential apocalypse in each one." she threw up her hand. "Who knows? Maybe the war with Wutai will prevent another apocalypse." She grumbled at a whisper Danny could hear. "I know when the war started. But not exactly when it will end." She flipped the notebook shut and shoved it in her pocket. "With my bad luck, the day it ends, everything will happen at once. And We'll get overwhelmed."

She continued. "There is a war going on right now, people are dying. The planet is slowly dying. ShinRa is choking Her. Who knows how many actual apocalypses could happen, or be prevented, in the next I dunno how many years? And I'm sitting here, wondering about getting a damned shitty job. So I can pay my bills beyond the next three days. Different DJ, but it's all the same shitty music." She threw herself back, to lean against the wall herself.

Danny sighed himself, "OK, so things are the way they are. But..."

"But?" She asked him.

"But I'm still helping. Making ShinRa bleed."

Marin shrugged. "It's more proactive than just having some random day-job, yeah."

"I could talk to my boss. Uh" He looked around the room. "Do you have any weapons?"

"Not unless you count this belt knife I use to eat with." She jangled her bracelet. "I have some materia." She threw her arm over her eyes. "It's been five months since my last Tai-Chi class. Not that that was real fighting. Face it Danny. Whatever happened to you the last few months to make you useful to them. I don't have the sorts of skills they're looking for." She adjusted her bracelet in vain again. "Unless you know where I can find a fabric store. I was planning on going to town to find whatever useful tools of the trade I could find. Now That I'm not stuck with what few things are in Icicle Inn."

"Icicle Inn? Where's that?"

"It's a small resort just below the north pole."

Danny fingered the winter coat pocking out of her rucksack. "Looks cold."

"It is. It very cold this time of year. Come February, it will only get colder."

"How cold is it in the summer?"

She sat up, "Lemme think. It's so cold right now, that walking through the snow in your pj's at night, you started suffering from hypothermia in less than a minute." she shrugged, "At least they use metric for the temperature, like rational people."

"And how about summer?"

"Those pj's at night? Maybe three minutes. The snow pretty much never melts." She pulled out the map Kari had given her and pointed to Kuar-Glen "We're here."

"I know."

Marin pointed where Icicle inn is. "And I ended up here."

Danny looked at the window. Marin had pulled down the curtain, but compared to icicle inn, October was balmy this time of year. "Shouldn't it be warmer there or colder here?"

Marin shook her head. "It's the Wound in the North crater." She pointed out the circular arete of mountains on the northern-most part of the northern continent. "That's a two-thousand year-old crater. Where the life stream has been leaking out ever since." she shook her head. "I don't remember if the planet is sucking in the heat to try to heal itself, or if that much Lifestream is making the North Pole so cold. But it's artificially cold up there."

"Lifestream coming out of the surface?" Danny wondered. "Have you seen it?"

Marin shook her head, carefully folding the map back up and putting it in her pocket. "Not directly, but the Lifestream leaking out goes so high over those mountains that it's like the northern lights are on every night of the year."

"Wow, I'd like to see that."