A/N: chapter by me... i cant remember how long its been since I updated this, so sorry if its been a while

Enjoy

Chapter 12

Elena sat in the reception, waiting for Rude to come back. She kept replaying the last events in their mission, and felt her eyes burning hot with tears as she did so. It was her fault, and she knew it. She should have just shot the man, even if she had hit Reno, he would have still been in for a chance.

"Elena?" she looked up to see Rude approaching her. "We're not even allowed in." he sighed sitting next to her.

"Why not?"

"They're trying to stabilize him." Rude said, altering his sunglasses. "They don't want anyone in there just yet."

"Stabilize him?" Elena asked, her eyes wide, "Does that mean..?"

"The guy managed to do quite a bit of damage apparently."

Elena looked at Rude. Despite his sunglasses, she could see the immense worry in his eyes that she had never seen before. She understood of course; she had no idea how long they had been partners for, but they must be very good friends by now.
"Do you think he'll be ok?" Elena asked in an attempt to break the silence.

"Yeah." Rude said immediately. "He's been in worse states than this."

"Worse? Like what?" Elena asked curiously.

"Well, once he was declared legally dead for a whole 5 minutes."

"He died?" Elena said, her voice slightly higher than usual.

"Well, his heart stopped, and he wasn't breathing…" Rude said quietly. It must have been quite strange for him to be actually talking this much.

"When was that?" Elena asked him.

"He was let out about three days before you came for your first test." Rude told her.

"Really? He must sure be a fighter…" Elena trailed off, looking at the white ceiling above her. "So if you're so convinced he'll make it, why do you look so worried?" she asked, breaking the silence again.

"Because the doctors here know he's from Shinra. They remember him from last time." Rude said, looking down.

"So?"

"They messed up his treatment every time he's been here. They ended up making him worse. Tseng's on his way here now, and as soon as Reno's stable, Tseng'll pull him out of here, and back to the Shinra infirmary."

Time seemed to fly by, and before Elena knew it, she was back at the Shin-Ra headquarters, waiting for Tseng to come back after sorting Reno out. She really couldn't believe that the hospitals would do something like that to someone. But then again, Rude wouldn't be lying, he wouldn't waste his breath to tell Elena a blatant lie. Maybe she was just too young; too inexperienced to understand the hatred a normal person can have of a Turk. Of course she knew that the job of a Turk was not an approved one, but to actually put someone through that amount of pain, it was misuse of a highly valued position in society, and no doctor had the right to do it.

"Sorry if I had you worried there 'Laney." a voice came from the doorway. Elena looked up quickly and saw Reno standing there, smiling at her. His shirt was unbuttoned and Elena could see the bandages that covered his wound. Suddenly she felt another familiar pang of guilt. Although he was smiling, his face was even paler than usual, and he looked somewhat delicate.

"Don't look so bad." He said, walking slowly up to her.

"How are you up? They spent about 3 hours trying to stabilize you. You can't have been awake for more than 10 minutes." Elena said disbelievingly.

"Meh, Tseng doesn't know I'm outta bed. But he'll get over it. I'm fine really; worst of it's over with now eh?" Reno grinned at her.

"You must be tougher than you look… much tougher." Elena said. She couldn't stop herself from smiling at Reno's shocked expression.

"What's that s'posed to mean?" he said, crossing his arms.

"Oh nothing…" Elena rolled her eyes. "Are you sure you're alright?"

Elena stared at him, a pained expression had come to his eyes, and he seemed to stop breathing for a minute.

"Yeah… great…" he wheezed.

"Reno!?" Elena heard Tseng shout from outside. "What the hell do you think you're doing? Get back to the infirmary now!"

"Oh crap…" Reno sighed. He made to step backwards, but stumbled slightly and fell, just in time for Tseng to catch him and stopping him from hitting his head on the wall.

"You idiot…" Tseng muttered. He hauled Reno over his back and carried him off back to the infirmary. Elena wasn't sure if he was conscious or not, but Tseng didn't seem like the kind of person to willingly carry him for no reason. Elena sighed; she really had no idea how Reno had gotten all the way over there in the first place. All this did was emphasize the decision she had come to a long time ago; Reno was certainly an interesting man.