Just a quick nod to say thanks to all the people that have reviewed and made inputs on this story (I like 'em more than those 'OMG! Rite more!' kinds). And for people that reviewed or PMed me about not liking how I seemed to twist Godo into a 'villain' for the purpose of the last chapter, it's not really the case. He'll pop back up in later chapters, not being all 'Rargh! My daughter! Fuck you, you fucking fucks, I'm the Emperor!'. Dude was just ill-informed and crazy pissed about his daughter being put in danger.
I rewrote this chapter a few times, and I'm still not a fan of it. The Turks are falling apart too, and Reeve has a plan.
He ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time, Rude right on his heels, the noise of their footsteps in the confined area much too loud, creating a racket that echoed around them, deafening them to any sort of indication of what could be awaiting them at their destination. Hopefully the heavy fire doors leading to each floor would muffle the noise enough for whatever intruders to not hear them coming.
Whatever it was, it had to have been bad. And if Reno were still alive, he was going to kill the red-head himself. 'Nothing's gonna happen' the red-head had assured him, as he practically begged the older man to just run one single, 'teensy-tinesy' little errand.
He had objected at first to going across town, wanting to tell Reno to pick up the parcel himself if it was so important. But Rude had eventually agreed that they'd pick it up. Reno had given them the biggest shit-eating grin in the world, slapped Rude on the shoulder cheerfully, and gave the other man a bright 'thanks pal, that's why I love ya' before he'd turned away and headed back to his post by the double doors at the end of the hall.
Those two should have been split up years ago. Never sat too well when partners became too close. Best to have a strictly business-oriented partnership. Too many crack-ups happened in the Turks' past when an issue had broken the back of one of the partnerships. He remembered when he had first been brought into to the Turks, it had been to replace a man named Grayson Galli. He'd committed suicide after an incident involving the death of his partner. He'd left his partner, wounded, to complete a mission. She had complained he was trying to mother her when he insisted on taking care of her first, insisted that she would be fine. From what he knew, the woman, Elsa, he believed her name had been, had bled out by the time he had gotten back to her. Galli had seemed relatively unfazed by it, until one morning, they had found him, strangled to death, his own garrote fastened around his neck.
Heidegger had explained the whole mess to him, as he had been presented with his own brand-new, neatly pressed suit. He hadn't been out of Wutai long then, didn't exactly know what he was getting into. That was the problem with the Turks. Heidegger never explained the score to the newest members. You discovered the reality of the situation from the older members, the veterans that were too jaded to even care anymore that the job was little more than a looming death sentence.
But they wanted the Turks to last as long as possible before they would give out. Grayson Galli, in Heidegger's opinion, could have been useful for more missions. But because he had gotten too attached to his partner, they had lost two bodies, instead of just one. 'Waste of resources' was how Heidegger put it. You weren't supposed to let your emotions get the best of you. Weren't even supposed to have them. The blue suit was meant to constrict the life out of you, take away everything, save for the need to survive, the obligation to carry out missions, no matter the cost.
He had been determined to keep any partnerships from becoming too closely knit. When he had first paired Reno and Rude together, he had figured they would keep things strictly business-like; Hell Rude was so messed up after the war, he barely spoke to any of them, generally kept completely to himself. He hadn't suspected that the two would manage to click, do such good work together. Time and time again, he had tried to rotate the partnerships, but Heidegger and President Shinra had overruled him, stating that they were surprisingly efficient at their work, and to keep them working together, for consistency. That, and Hojo had constantly demanded Valley Crawford and Mirabella LaJara to accompany him to Nibelheim, for a number of missions, before Sephiroth destroyed the town. With those two constantly having to answer the scientist's beck and call, it had been just himself with Reno and Rude taking other missions. And then, after what happened to Valley and Mira, there was no way he could have kept Reno and Rude apart. Heidegger refused to bolster their numbers for a long time, and even then, only brought in Elena after Reno was beaten by AVALANCHE in Sector Seven.
He didn't mind that those two got on so well, honestly. Good to have someone to trust in their job. But the fact that Rude would agree to something that strayed from their itinerary, just on the basis that they were friends, well…..
Look at what happened.
They'd been halfway way across town when Elena had begun pounding away incessantly on her signaler, and it had taken them much too long to double back to the hospital. Not only that, but Elena's continuous hails had stopped about five minutes ago, leaving him worried that they would get back too late to be of any use. Had they been over-taken? Were they fighting now? Defeated? Dead?
They'd seen all of the reporters swarming around the front entrance as they had neared the hospital; Rude had pointed out the almost garishly ornate uniforms of the Wutaian Royal Guards. He had an idea of what the presence of Wutai meant. Godo had probably come to reclaim his daughter. The man was an old, over-stuffed relic of a time when Wutai hadn't been a complete joke in terms of power. Godo seemed to live and breathe the idea that someday, his country would once again be a global power, like it had been before Shinra put the pompous old fool in his place.
If the emperor had been there, and had simply taken his daughter home, he would still be incensed about arriving too late to do anything about the situation. Maybe the others wouldn't stand up to the man, antsy and uncertain because of his status, the fact that they couldn't really keep his daughter away from him, and just let the foreigner push them all around, not wanting to cause any more trouble.
He didn't care. If Godo were up there, going along on some falsely-perceived powertrip, he wanted to get even a minute face-to-face with him. He hadn't seen the man in over a decade, should have had plenty of time to let the old wounds heal, but he still held a grudge. He was right, he knew he'd been right about the whole futility of trying to declare war on an area that was of heavy interest to the Shinra. But for all his protests, all his arguments, he hadn't changed the emperor's mind. He'd simply gained the man's ire.
He'd been exiled from the country for his insolence in the face of Godo's plans, his entire life thrown into disarray because he was the only one that had been willing to point out the utter foolishness of what the emperor though was absolutely fail-safe.
Tseng had been honorable about the incident, certainly much more accepting about the situation than others before him had been. He didn't beg, plead, sob. He kept his dignity in the entire process; the public denouncing, being forced to surrender his weapons, his uniform in a very, very public 'ceremony'. He sometimes wondered if his family still felt the dishonor, the humiliation of having to watch him be stripped of his rank and forced to walk through the street, flanked like a dangerous prisoner by his former comrades, some sort of spectacle to show that this was what happened when you went against the emperor.
Depending on the severity of the 'crime', and who the offender was, public opinion differed. Turnout was mandatory, to set an example, but he in his time had been an upstanding young man, well respected among the people, a man of good breeding, good morals. It had been a somber, almost silent affair. Many were distraught to see him go. He was to never step foot in his home country again, his name blacklisted along with the others that had gained crossed Godo somehow; forever shamed in the eyes of Wutai.
Word was that most of those exiled had committed suicide over the utter shame of their situation. But Tseng had felt himself above such a triviality. Such concepts of shame and honor were Wutaian ones. After that, he felt no need to consider himself as such. In time, he had ended up in Midgar, in Shinra. His knowledge of the common tongue was poor. To this day he spoke with a very heavy accent. The President had seemed delighted to meet him, despite the fact that prejudice against Wutaians was extremely high at that point internationally.
He had no family, no friends, no connections. Those had all been left behind. He was a skilled warrior, good education, tactical experience, and knew of the inner workings of Wutai. Now if only they could just do something about his language. With credentials such as that, he had been hired and shuffled into the Turks almost immediately, needing fresh blood after the loss of Grayson and Elsa. He had never heard of the group; Shinra rarely stepped foot in Wutai. Well, not before the war, anyway.
Last he'd seen of the emperor, it was when he was signing to the terms of Wutai'a surrender. He had accompanied the President as a 'security measure', though, as he figured, it was more of a powerplay, something else to rub Godo's face in; one of his former captains of the guard standing there, decked out in Turks' blue. When the emperor had seen him, the look on the old man's face had been priceless. Shock, betrayal, disgust, hatred….. an entire spectrum of emotions tied up in that one look.
But that hadn't sated him. Not nearly enough. He still ached, childishly, for some kind of revenge. One minute to look him in the eye and point out that he had been right, and for all that Godo had done to him, the old man had been wrong all along.
Third floor…..
He didn't stop, didn't even slow, just rammed the bar with his shoulder, popping the catch on the door and ducking into the hall, partially in a crouch, Rude stopping just outside the threshold, swinging his gun around the corner, both of them ready to open fire. Only…..
Whatever had happened, it looked like they were too late to the party. Reeve was standing with Cid and Barret, Elena off to the side. She looked like she had been getting changed, standing there barefoot, in a pair of cotton lounge slacks with the waist and cuffs rolled a few times. Her hair was a little disheveled, makeup taken off one eye but not the other. Past them, Reno was standing by the double doors at the other end of the hall, looking like he was about to go off at any moment. And…..
Tifa was on the floor, crumpled against the wall, blood puddled beneath her head, eyes open and staring emptily toward the other wall.
Save for the martial artist, all eyes had turned toward the commotion of their hasty entrance, and they all just tiredly regarded them for a moment, before dropping their gazes. All except for Elena. After staring at them for a few silent moments, she stormed towards them, hands clenched into fists, absolutely seething.
"Where the fuck were you two?!" She screeched, voice almost enough to make him wince. She had to have been extremely put-off if she didn't put in a 'sir' at the end of her statement. She always said 'sir' when addressing him, even when she was none-too-pleased. Even when he told her time and time again it wasn't necessary. "We could've used some help here! I was hailing you guys for a good fifteen minutes!"
He sighed disgustedly and slid his gun into its holster at his left hip, brushing off Elena's question as he assessed the situation. The fact Yuffie wasn't there, and the fact that they had noticed Wutaian guardsmen outside of the hospital seemed to indicate his theory had been correct. Though, it wasn't rocket science. What other reason would Wutai have had to come here?
"Godo came for his daughter." He sighed, not making a question of it, nor an observation. The statement came out harsh and impolite, his refusal to speak of the emperor politely by addressing him by his status was something he had refused to do since his exile.
"Fff….yeah! You think?!" Elena shot back hotly. Honestly, why couldn't she ever have been this aggressive when they had still worked for Shinra? "And every fucking media outlet on the continent was buzzing around in here with them! Soon as the daytime broadcast hits….." She paused drawing her thumb across her throat in a quick motion. "We'll have a fucking lynch mob burning this place to the ground or something."
"I doubt we would have been able to do much good, if that were the case." He sighed lowly, shaking his head. One reporter, people might not have missed. But the gaggle they had seen surrounding the entrance, well, it would be rather…..suspicious if they all suddenly disappeared. Liquidating that many paparazzo probably wasn't within their power now anyway, especially with Reeve attempting to calm the masses. He never thought he would find himself getting nostalgic for the old days. Heidegger and the President would have given them the go-ahead, the order to do such a thing. Make it look like some horrible accident, or some scapegoat to pin it upon.
"Is she dead?" Rude asked from over his left shoulder, piping up before Elena could continue screaming at them, obviously speaking of Tifa, who hadn't moved, hadn't made any sign that she was cognizant of her surroundings in the least. And that blood slicked across the floor beneath her skull, well…..
"Nah. She and Godo got in an argument or somethin'. Dunno, they were going back and forth in that fuckin' ching-chang talk, she kept trying to get a minute to say goodbye to the kid, and he just flat out kung-fued her. She seemed fucked up too, from the looks of it. Like she was stoned or something."
Tseng pursed his lips agitatedly, glaring at Reno. As un-PC as the redhead often got, and as used to it as he was, boorish statements such as 'ching-chang talk' to refer to the Wutaian language never failed to disgust him. That, and the fact that he was not even ten feet from her, yet hadn't offered her the slightest assistance. Certainly, Reno wanted to uphold his 'image' in front of AVALANCHE. He could understand the brash, devil-may-care bravado Reno projected, and yes, they had been their enemies, targets, in the past. But Reno could still offer some common courtesy to an injured woman, for God's sake. He could still act like a human being. Reno was certainly aching for a beating from somebody tonight.
"And you aren't helping her why?" He asked crisply, making his way toward Tifa with Rude behind him, though his gaze never left Reno.
"Don't you fuckin' start, man." He shot back, anger flaring to life, springing to life in his face, his stance, his voice. He generally spoke with an easy, lazy drawl, regardless of who he was talking to or what the situation was. Always the same tone, same vocabulary. He could be speaking to one of their targets, or the President, it didn't matter. Always the same laid back croon, peppered with little smirks and jokes.
But hit a nerve with him, and it all just seemed to evaporate, the ticking time-bomb beneath the nonplussed appearance going off at full force.
Things were going to Hell all around them. Scratch that. Things were Hell all around them. Bad enough they were caught up in helping (failing to help?) Reeve keep the situation under wraps, but now they were going off on one another as well, no real enemy to divert their aggression toward.
He wasn't too happy to have any part in this. But the Turks had possibly a worse rap than AVALANCHE as far as the public was concerned. Time to put on a fresh face, and hope people would eventually forget about the bastards in blue.
He continued to glare at Reno, but knelt down toward Tifa, looking her over.
"Are you dead?" He asked lowly, speaking in Wutaian, glad to use his own language, rather than the clipped, bastard language that felt so clumsy on his tongue, even after so long.
She didn't reply at first, and he almost thought she would ignore him altogether, when she shifted slightly, pushing herself unsteadily into a sitting position, legs splayed in a very unladylike fashion, given her current state of dress. She was shaking slightly, tremors running up and down her bare legs, the muscles not swaddled beneath medical tape twitching beneath the skin. She always seemed a model of vitality, all compact, lean muscle, strength, both physical and mental that kept her from breaking under all sorts of pressure, the ability to keep the morale of the others up, even if she didn't even believe her own words…..
This defeated, jittery mess was nothing like the woman he had so painstakingly studied, nearly obsessed over when he had been looking into AVALANCHE's members. Not disgustingly optimistic as Aerith could often get, but relying on some inner strength, some deep-rooted resolve. Nothing had broken them yet, they could endure time and time again.
But now…..
"Are you dead?" She echoed, almost mockingly, the conversation almost replicating the one they'd had when she had first woken up in the hospital, disoriented enough to believe herself speaking to a dead man. She brought her left hand up, wiping clumsily at her bloodied face, blood smearing across her palm, across her skin, making a large red smudge. She held her hand out, studying it for a moment, before letting it drop back to the ground with a wet slap against the tiles.
He sighed through his nose, pulling out a handkerchief and kneeling down to her level, carefully daubing at her upper lip, trying to catch some of the blood.
"He hit you."
She just smiled, an almost sleepy tug on her lips, teeth such a stark contrast against the clownish red smudges surrounding her mouth.
"Sure I had it coming." She replied, shoulders twitching, causing her to jerk slightly. "Old man's got a temper like his kid. Besides, you pull somebody's only family into something like this, nearly get 'em killed, they're not going to shake your hand and shower you with praises, are they?"
"That doesn't allow him to make such a scene. Doesn't give him the right to attack an incapacitated woman."
"But it'd be alright for him to take a swing at Barret or Cid?" She replied rhetorically, rolling her eyes. "We endangered the life of the heir to the Wutaian throne. Of course the guy's going to want to take his anger out on somebody. I got in his face, I tried to keep him from taking his daughter, I am something he doesn't much care for in the first place. That, combined with the fact that he only has the same information everybody else has about us, I'm probably lucky I got off with just this." She murmured, tapping a finger to her nose, faint hints of discoloration beginning to blossom beneath her fair skin. That was another thing about her. She never wanted to blame anybody else, aside from the Shinra. She would heap the blame on herself if she needed to; like she didn't believe most people were truly evil. They were victims as well. They had a right to be angry about what they didn't understand.
He himself wasn't such a forgiving type. If you lashed out at the wrong person because of a lack of information, you were in the wrong and an idiot. Ignorance didn't allow one a carte blanche to make some possibly devastating situation just because you were too stupid to inform yourself of all angles.
Maybe that forgiving mindset was what made her one of the 'good' guys, and him one of the 'bad' ones.
"Gray-area vigilante shit isn't very rewarding, huh?" She sighed, letting her head roll back, crown of her head resting against the wall, sending the blood trickling in a lazy diagonal path down her cheeks.
"No, I suppose not." He agreed, eyeing the patchwork of stitches holding together the left side of her forehead, gaze trailing down toward the unbandaged burns on her right arm. She almost acted as if the appendage wasn't there anymore, let it sit like dead weight most of the time. "You-"
He stopped short, taking in the way she looked at him, as if looking right through him, an inappropriate little smile tugging sporadically at her lips, the little twitches and tremors sending her knees jerking every now and then.
"You're not well, are you?" He finally settled on asking, glancing over his shoulder. Rude was still standing there, eyeing Tifa disapprovingly, despite the fact that he was completely oblivious to the topic of conversation between the two.
Further down the hall, Reeve was pacing back and forth, extremely agitated, conversing in low tones with the other two AVALANCHE members and Elena. Peering to his right, Reno was still standing guard, sulking and fuming, having no current outlet for his anger.
She just let out a hiccupping little laugh, letting the sound dissolve into a slight whine as she sucked in a breath.
Rude nudged at him, quick little knee-jerk to his elbow, faint click from the artificial joint audible to his ears. It was hard to notice, unless you were close by it. He glanced at him again, questioningly.
The other man shifted the parcel he was holding to his right hand, and brought his freed up hand toward his mouth, curled in a loose fist. He flicked his thumb against the inside of his index finger, mimicking the motion of popping something into his mouth.
Well….. that certainly explained Tifa's little sporadic movements and distant mindset. Girl was probably high as a kite if she had been popping pills. At least the knocks she'd taken weren't bothering her too much. Her end of the conversation was the same kind of deep, infinitely understanding stance she generally upheld, despite her muddled mindset. No wonder she had been content to just lie on the floor after getting thrown over. Most likely feeling no pain, and content to just drift in and out of her own, hazy little world.
He swiped at the blood on her face again, sighing.
"As…..comfortable as you seem to be just sitting there, would you begrudge me to take you back to your room? I don't like to leave people bleeding on the floor." He offered, reaching down and lightly taking hold of her left wrist, which came up easily enough, leaving a dark red handprint on the tile in its wake.
She squinted a little, as if trying to process the comment, shaking her head.
"You were in the wrong line of work then, weren't you?" She asked, a hint of bitterness toeing around the edge of the otherwise dazed tone.
"People I'm not actively attempting to kill." He rectified, shifting his grip on her uncertainly. How best to pull her up with the least risk of jarring one of her injuries…..?
After a moment of deliberation, he settled for hooking his hands under her armpits and hoisting her up, like he was hefting a child over some slight obstacle. She swooned a little, unsteady on her feet, and nearly took a faceplant back onto the tile before he caught her, quickly steering her toward the open door of her room. He flicked the lightswitch on, wincing slightly against the burst of the strong fluorescent lighting and walked her toward the bed, keeping his hands on her shoulders as she turned and maneuvered herself until she was perched on the edge of it, spine curved as she slumped forward, staring at her burned arm.
The areas where the blisters had ruptured looked shiny slick and raw, little transparent flaps of skin smushed up in ridges that would eventually dry to stiff pieces of dead skin, which she'd probably end up picking at if the maddening hot ache bothered her enough.
Still holding her steady, hands lightly settled on her shoulders, he looked around the room uncertainly, checking for some gauze, some antiseptic, something that he could use to clean up the young woman's bloodied face.
Out in the hall, the doors banged open, and he heard the sharp pop that meant Reno had pulled his weapon on the intruder, ready to take his frustration out on whoever it was.
"Oh please. Put that thing away." The sharp voice wafted into the room, tone loaded with disgust. He could imagine the speaker waggling her finger disapprovingly toward Reno as they stared each other down.
Footsteps, coming toward, entering, the room, and he glanced back, seeing the burly form of Nurse Talbot standing there, looking Tifa over with a kind of resignation. Like she had seen the martial artist this roughed up and despondent before.
"Honestly Tifa." She sighed to herself, shaking her head as she strode into the room, unceremoniously bumping Tseng out of her way, as she looked her patient over. "Hand me the gauze in that drawer over there."
It took him a moment to realize that she was speaking to him. Obediently, he made his way to the bedside table, sliding the drawer open. A number of gauze pads were set in there, splayed around messily in an attempt to cover the empty blister packs tossed in there as well, foil backing punctured, probably by a fingernail. There were probably a dozen or so empty dosage packets in there. She couldn't have taken them all at once, she'd probably be goddamn comatose by now.
Well, it wasn't his concern. He pushed the blister packs to the back of the drawer and pulled out a few packets of gauze, watching silently as Janice tore two of them open, neatly folding and rolling them into little cylinders, which she proceeded to carefully insert up Tifa's nostrils to stem the bloodflow.
Didn't even bother to throw gloves on...
"I'm going to patch her up and have a little talk with her. Do you mind passing me a pair of gloves before you leave?" She wasn't even looking at him as she spoke, and her words implied that it wasn't open for him to mill about while she presumably chewed Tifa out for going and getting herself in a situation like this.
He tossed a few crumpled latex gloves at her from the dispenser affixed to the wall and headed for the door, when Tifa picked her head up, snuffling slightly around the plugs of gauze.
"What about Nanaki?" She asked, in the common tongue this time, giving him pause. He looked back at her, seeing the hazy, disjointed grin, the glossy glaze to her eyes, all reigned in, leaving her deadly serious; sober in her sudden thought.
"He's gone back to the Canyon."
"I know." Hollow, almost angry retort "He doesn't know that people know." Not the most eloquent way of putting it, but he got the gist of her question. Once word got out, would people come after him? Trek to the canyon on a suspicion that one of their self-appointed targets was there? The canyon didn't have much in the way of technology, the residents stressed simple living, off the land, getting in touch with nature. Spiritualist crap was what he thought of it. Phoning in a warning would have been difficult.
"Someone will take care of it." He replied dismissively, as he backed himself out of the room, pulling the door shut behind him. Trying not to shudder at the sight of her staring at him dully, bloodied mouth once again curling into a tiny smirk, as if she couldn't help it. God only knew what was going on in that mind of hers.
"Tseng, get a move on, come on!" Reeve barked at him as soon as he reemerged from Tifa's room, causing him to look toward the executive, seeing him standing there, overcoat slung over his arm, some bundled up parcel in that starchy white hospital bedding tucked in at the crook of his elbow. He had an almost manic look in his dark-rimmed eyes, practically thrumming with nervous energy.
"Beg your pardon?" He asked lowly, obviously having missed something while tending to Tifa.
"Get to the roof, get the chopper ready." He barked, and Tseng gave a curt nod, already starting for the stairwell, though he gave Reeve a questioning glance as he neared the others. They'd monopolized the landing zone on the hospital roof for their own personal needs, kept a salvaged Shinra helicopter up there. A heliport on the roof had to be a standard feature for hospitals on the continent, in case the need for immediate medical attention in Shinra-related matters became necessary. God knew that Kalm of all places didn't feature airlift med-evac, or any sort of localized air traffic for that matter.
"Where are we going?" The executive seemed to have some sort of plan, but he wasn't sure he'd like to hear what it was. He had an inkling of what it might be though.
"The relief area, soon as we goddamn can." He replied sharply, nodding toward Rude. "Go with him, get a hold of Domino, tell him to call an emergency assembly for all refugees and personnel." The other man just nodded glumly, heading for the stairwell with his head dipped, as if trying to avoid Elena's furious glare as he passed by.
"Am emergency assembly?" Tseng echoed, eyes narrowing. "You're not going to-"
"You're goddamn right I am." Reeve cut in evenly. He had to be riled up if he was spitting out so many 'goddamns' in rapid succession. It was the closest he ever got to swearing. "They want answers, they're going to get their answers."
"Are you sure that's wise?"
A rueful grin twisted thinly at Reeve's mouth, and he shook his head, openly admitting to the folly of his plan.
"Of course it's not. It's a gamble. I'm going to beat them to the table on this one."
"Hey, boss man, what about us?" Reno piped up from his self-appointed sentry position, seeming to perk up at the idea of some sort of action.
"Somebody has to stay here. If things get out of hand, somebody needs to be here to get them" He jerked his thumb toward Barret and Cid quickly "Out of here. And since I imagine this won't go particularly smoothly, you certainly don't do much to diffuse a tense situation."
"Alright, fine, whatever." He shrugged, trying to hide the bruised-black rage prickling beneath his skin at the mere suggestion that he was incompetent with his light, unruffled tone. He shifted his gaze toward Tseng and Rude appraisingly "You guys at least manage to score me what I asked for?"
The parcel Rude had been carrying was suddenly hurled none-too-gently over his shoulder toward the redhead, though it missed its mark and fell a few feet short, skitting along the ground in its wax-paper wrapping, bumping to a stop against one scuffed up boot.
He scooped it up and greedily uncrimped the bag, pulling out a somewhat smashed looking pastry, nodding appraisingly at it and ripping off a piece of dough with his teeth before dropping it back in.
"Thanks guys. Don't let 'em near your goods, hear me?" He called around the mouthful after them as Rude disappeared through the stairwell door, footsteps sounding dully on the concrete steps.
Tseng pointedly ignored the murderous look Elena shot him, the way she hissed 'a fucking danish' her words saturated with venom. Stole a sidelong glance at Barret and Cid who were staring back evenly, looking ignored and out of place all of a sudden. Cid offered a thin smile, scrubbing the palm of one splinted hand across his face roughly. He was beginning to sport the scruffy beginnings of a beard, not being able to handle a razor in his current state.
He nodded back at them, following Rude back into the stairwell, trudging dutifully up the steps after him, all the pent up fire of an impending fight replaced with a sullen expectancy, knowing that it was just himself and Rude that would be the only thing keeping Reeve safe from a mass of disheartened refugees. Ones that would probably be quick to anger at the mention of AVALANCHE.
At least it was a return to the old form. Almost-certain suicide runs thinly veiled under the guise of a 'mission'. Was Reeve sending himself and Rude because of their more professional poise, or...
Was it because they'd compromised their current 'job' by running an errand for Reno?
He'd shot one last look back at the redhead, saw him chewing away contentedly on another mouthful of the pastry, seemingly not caring about the situation anymore, since he'd gotten what he wanted. The redhead had given that easy wave, mouthed a trite little 'good luck' at him, grinning widely, probably glad he didn't have to go to the relief site with them.
If he got out of this trip alive, if he got back to the hospital in one functional piece, he was going to kill Reno himself. Or….. no. He wouldn't. He'd probably be doing the younger man a favor.
And he wasn't going to be doing any of those for Reno.
Not any goddamn more.