Writer's Note: Every time I reread this I add bits more to sentences and change a few things, and at this point I just need to stop. I'm still very mixed about the characterizations in this chapter, but I wanted to get this up in good time because this'll be TWO Green Dreams chapters in a single month, and that hasn't happened in a long time. So cheers! I cannot wait until that remake comes out!
Green Dreams
Chapter Forty: Exposure
"Where is Mother?" Loz yelled, shaking the last living soldier while Kadaj smashed whatever hadn't already been crushed, burnt, or pulverized around the outpost. Yazoo yawned behind his hand and leaned against the bloodstained wall to watch. The fat man and his red-dressed angel had told them Mother was near here, but Yazoo wasn't surprised that sniveling man in the lab coat had lied.
"I don't feel her," Kadaj whined when he got bored and wandered back over to his brother. "This is taking too long. Mother is waiting."
"Don't cry, Kadaj," Yazoo said condescendingly.
"I told you we should have asked brother."
"Brother's looking for her too," Yazoo reminded him. "And if we ask him then he might tell our other—" Kadaj snarled like a rabid dog to cut him off.
"We will bring Mother to him just as she wants, and then I will be the favorite. Why does she like him so much anyway? He doesn't even love her like we do!" Kadaj's voice cracked and Yazoo watched impassively as their most spirited brother started kicking a dead body, childishly angry at what he couldn't understand. Glancing the other way, Yazoo saw Loz still demanding answers from the soldier. Eventually he shook the man so hard his head snapped back with a crack and the soldier went limp.
"You broke him," Yazoo sighed, and Loz dropped the body and lumbered over.
"Mother's not here," he said redundantly. Her presence was no brighter here than it had been on the other continent. The mako reactor had given them hope, but even after slaughtering their way inside there hadn't been anything interesting.
"She wouldn't forgive that fat man for lying," Kadaj whined, looking over the horizon at the oncoming truck. "When he gets here I say we show him what Mother would do."
"And the angel?" Yazoo asked, remembered that one-winged man. He was infinitely more dangerous than the bearded man in the lab coat.
"We rip his wing off of course," Kadaj said gleefully.
SOLDIERs typically patrolled the roads around Midgar, but it looked like they were slacking off or had been called away. Cloud had been forced to fight off several fiends, and he'd driven through at least one herd of something with six legs that were thankfully not fast enough to catch him.
He'd been using his speed and agility from the bike to deal with every monster in his way, but behind the next blind corner was something Cloud couldn't take on one-handed. Standing in the middle of the road was an Aps, and as Cloud came around the bend his reflexes kicked into action and he jerked the bike to the side, veering off to the right so sharply skid marks cut across the dirt road.
The stolen bike wasn't Fenrir though, and the shocks couldn't handle the stress of the move, so Cloud didn't make it ten feet past the Aps before the bike tilted too far and he was thrown off. He cracked a tooth as he hit the ground and rolled, hearing the dull banging of metal as the motorcycle bounced and finally stopped skidding some forty yards away. The Aps had been surprised by Cloud's appearance, so the blond had time to stand up and wipe away the blood on his mouth before the creature could figure out what had happened. One glance at the bike showed a blown out back tire, completely twisted handlebars, and a dent in one of the fuel tanks. Great, he'd have to walk.
The Aps turned fully to the blond and crouched at the ready, letting out a bellow as a warning that shook the small rocks on the ground. Not intimidated, Cloud readied First Tsurugi and charged. Fire3 did significant damage to the hide, and while the Aps was still batting flames away from its face, Cloud neatly separated tail and torso. The monster shrieked at such a high octave Cloud had to abandon the follow-up attack to get some distance for his ringing eardrums.
That was a lucky shot though, as the Aps wasn't stupid enough to let him get that close again. It fought more defensively, and that forced Cloud to rely more on magic and feints, avoiding those sharp tusks on the monsters shoulders that it tried more than once to gore him on. Cloud was nimble, but he couldn't maintain the anti-gravity fighting he'd always used before, so the endless leaping and jumping around to avoid swipes and poison breath were wearing on him. The battle dragged out long enough that the patrol finally showed up.
"Get back!" Cloud heard, and he barely flicked his head over to see three SOLDIERs in dusty uniforms running into the fray. He ignored them in favor of switching his grip and launching a one-handed blow to the face of the monster. First Tsurugi cut every time, but Cloud wasn't up to his old standards yet, so what should have been a savage blow ending up nicking the monster across its bloated cheek and bursting one of its venom sacks. Cloud landed on the other side of the Aps angry, yanking off the sleeve that the poison had splattered on.
The SOLDIERs reached him at the moment. "Ice2!" yelled one Second, sending down a shower of icicles that the monster brushed off with annoyance. Another ran over to him holding a Restore materia, but Cloud waved him off.
"It's weak to fire!" the blond shouted, shaking his head at the Seconds who took up a standard formation of attack. They were much easier to hit that way for the clumsy Aps, so after a second-long breather, Cloud returned to the battle. He ducked and dodged around to the backside of the monster to give it a distraction from the easily targeted Seconds.
The Seconds peppered the beast with blows on the front, their teamwork obviously well practiced, and one of them at least was very accurate with his gun, hitting the Aps in one cloudy eye to wrenched another yelp of pain out of the monster. Cloud hacked off a claw and crisscrossed the Aps' back with deep cuts amidst rounds of Fire until finally the creature started to stagger. One Second took the initiative and jumped, blade straight out, and stabbed the Aps directly in the heart. It wasn't a fast way to kill such a monster though, so when it collapsed to the ground in a cloud of dust it continued to wiggle like a fish on a hook before finally laying still.
Cloud set First Tsurugi on his back as the Seconds got their breath back, one looking a little green as the Aps gave a full body shudder before the nervous system gave out. Cloud thought about walking away then and there, but before he'd decided one SOLDIER came around the fiend and called to him. "Cloud Strife, right?"
Cloud nodded warily.
"You heading to Midgar? Looks like your bike's totaled." It was the one who'd slain the beast who spoke to him. The man pulled off his helmet to reveal an unremarkable face and introduced himself, before waving at the creature. "You really are the Lieutenant General's apprentice, huh? Hardly needed our help!" When Cloud didn't respond he scratched the top of his head and shrugged awkwardly. "Well, we're reporting back to Midgar, so jump in our truck and we'll take you back."
"I have a delivery to make first," Cloud lied, starting to walk back to his bike. Maybe salvaging the tire would be possible after all, and he could transfer the fuel from the dented tank to the undamaged one.
"You can't walk through the desert to wherever you're going," argued that Second again. Cloud had forgotten his name as soon as he'd said it. "Midgar's the closest city and you won't get in by tonight on foot, assuming you make it at all. That creature there," he said, pointing at the fallen Aps, "that's nothing compared to what comes out at night. Even Seconds have to move in groups of three."
Cloud hunched his shoulders. His plan had simply been to go to Mideel and see what he could find, but it didn't look like he was going to get away from these SOLDIERs. He could steal their truck maybe, but there were probably more inside and then he'd be wanted again by SOLDIER.
Cloud shook his head. "I really—"
The Second sighed before straightening up and adopting a formal military posture. "Third Class Cloud Strife, you are hereby ordered to return to Midgar in the safety of your peers. Do you understand?"
"You're ordering me?" Cloud asked, bewildered. No one had ever pulled rank like this before on him, and he didn't even feel like a member of Shinra's SOLDIER anymore. It was like a raccoon was telling him off for littering.
"Are you resisting orders?" the Second said warningly.
Cloud looked back at the bike, but really there wasn't any hope for it. It wasn't going to drive, and he couldn't outrun a truck, so it looked like he was going back to Midgar. He closed his eyes and turned back to the Seconds.
"No, sir."
Sephiroth sighed and stood up, checking his disgust as he always did. Hojo didn't ask a lot of him very often, but when the scientist demanded his presence somewhere it was in Sephiroth's best interest to show up. Skipping physicals and tests meant Hojo made them all the more rigorous and invasive the next time.
The email was succinct: Sephiroth, I have a test for you on the 67th floor. No sword needed.
Sephiroth strapped Masamune on anyway to annoy the scientist and headed out. At least he knew this couldn't be a long test, as Hojo knew the General was shipping out. As Sephiroth was waiting for the elevator and considering the best ways to quickly leave Hojo's upstairs lab, Zack's office door burst open. He strode out talking excitedly on his PHS.
"Seriously? No, seriously, right now?" Zack repeated, turning almost to knock on Sephiroth's door before spotting the General. He started waving frantically at his phone and Sephiroth felt the stirrings of a headache.
"Zachary…" he said with an undeniable growl in his voice. He had to meet with Hojo before their departure in one hour for Fort Condor and he wanted to get the former done so he could enjoy the latter. The rage Hojo typically built up in him would be perfect if they encountered the Triplets.
"Seph! Seconds just reported in that they have Cloud! They're patching me into their leader's comms right now!" Zack was vibrating and he couldn't seem to stop bouncing on his toes.
Sephiroth actually stopped short of stepping into the newly arrived elevator. He hadn't actually believed Cloud would return to Midgar. Neither of them had said it, but with the two week grace period nearly up they'd been ready to take any made-up mission they could get to the Nibelheim area. Cloud coming back of his own accord was, well… confusing. What did he have to gain by returning to Midgar except perhaps access to Hojo? Or had he returned for Sephiroth and Zack?
"Yes, this is Lieutenant-General Zack Fair. You've got Cloud there? My Cloud? Put him on then!" Zack waited impatiently as no doubt the PHS was handed over in a crowded transport unit. "Cloud? Cloud?"
Muffled but audible: "Zack?"
"Hey man, how's it going? How'd you end up with a bunch of Seconds? No wait, scratch that, how was leave? Glad you'll be back soon!" Zack was doing a very poor job of hiding his relief, or perhaps he wasn't trying at all.
"I'm fine; bike was destroyed by a fiend so I hitched a ride."
"I wish I could see you when you get back, but Seph and I are leaving for a mission. We'll be airborne before you get in, but you know where I hid my key if you want the apartment to yourself." Zack's giddiness was gradually fading now, and he met Sephiroth's eyes before he continued. "How was it?" he asked.
"Fine," Cloud said shortly, seeming determined not to answer the question. He didn't say anything more, which made Zack silently huff.
"Hey, wanna talk to Seph? He's right here." Zack passed the PHS over before Cloud could respond.
"Cloud, I hope you've improved while away," Sephiroth said, trying to think of anything to say at all. He didn't want to make Cloud clam up before he'd even stepped foot back in Midgar, but Sephiroth also didn't know how to express the unnamable feeling in his chest at confirmation of Cloud's return.
"Yeah, fought a few fiends," the blond replied.
"You will be ready for duty upon arrival?" Sephiroth asked, and Zack rolled his eyes.
"Yeah."
"I look forward to seeing your improvement personally when I return."
"Right, yeah," Cloud said, sounding uncomfortable now. Satisfied that he'd suitably warned Cloud of their pending meeting, Sephiroth handed the PHS back over to Zack.
"Hey Cloud, we're heading out in less than an hour so we won't see you. I'll leave some money in the apartment so you can order something since I bet you're starving and broke. Seph's heading—where are you going actually?"
"The labs," Sephiroth said, lip curling a little.
"Don't—!" he heard on the phone, before Cloud cut himself off.
"Don't what?" Sephiroth said, taking the PHS back from a surprised looking Zack.
"… Don't go to the labs. Just go on the mission."
Sephiroth's eyebrows went up, and he and Zack shared a look. "Speaking of the mission, Cloud, you may be able to provide insight." Sephiroth paused, but Cloud didn't say anything. Sephiroth could just barely hear his controlled breathing on the other end. "Three silver-haired men with powerful abilities destroyed Fort Condor two nights ago. Do you—"
Cloud hung up.
Sephiroth and Zack glanced at each other. "He definitely knows them," Zack finally said, sounding completely unsurprised.
Sephiroth looked down at the PHS with a mixture of annoyance and resignation. "Yes. Unfortunately, delaying the search to interrogate him would be more dangerous at this stage. Bors, Geatan, and Kunsel say they have a lead, and I do not want to risk the chance that they cannot handle the Triplets," Sephiroth replied. He handed back Zack's PHS and glanced at the elevator button to go up. He hesitated for a second, knowing he was supposed to be on the 67th floor to meet Hojo, but instead he pushed the down button and joined Zack on his way to ground floor.
Midgar stunk worse than Cloud remembered, a side effect of his increased mako levels. His senses had sharpened considerably, so now every garbage heap in the slums didn't just smell of trash, but of rust, mold, rot, and feces. Cloud didn't know how the Seconds could stand it as they drove up the highway and out of the underbelly of Midgar on to the plate.
They rolled into the SOLDIER garage and dropped the transport off. Cloud left the group immediately and bee-lined for Zack's apartment. He and Sephiroth should be long gone by now, which would give Cloud enough time to regroup, rest, and leave again. This time with a proper bike.
Four hours after a dinner of pizza from Zack's favorite place and in the middle of a nap, someone knocked on the door.
Cloud jerked awake immediately and tensed, reaching for First Tsurugi lying against the wall next to the bed.
"Cloooooud, it's me!" Reno yelled through the door, banging on it again. "C'mon, I had to find out you were back in Midgar because your buddy First penciled you in for a training session. Really? Lame dude," Reno complained as Cloud shuffled to the door. He opened it enough to see red hair before Reno pushed through and glanced around as he went for the couch.
"Huh, not a bad place actually. Loving the giant TV. Except, what happened there?" Reno pointed at the line cut three inches deep into the wall and Cloud determinedly looked away. "Oh shit, wait, I remember," Reno started and then stopped when he realized how uncomfortable it made Cloud.
"Fort Condor?" Cloud asked instead of a greeting, going to get some of the leftover pizza off the counter. Reno helped himself too.
"A complete shit-show. Fifty-two people dead in approximately twenty minutes. You ever seen it happen that fast?"
"Faster," Cloud said flatly.
"Right, stupid question."
They finished off the pizza as Reno recounted the events of the destruction of Fort Condor and what he'd learned since. No one was able to find an origin for the Triplets, not even Veld who apparently had bugs in the Science Department systems that Reno was now determined to find. The Turks were convinced this was a secret side project of Hojo's not on any known servers, while SOLDIER just wanted the three dead. Two Firsts and a Second were already hunting for the Triplets, and now the General, Lieutenant General, and four more Firsts from Midgar were joining them.
"Okay, now you've got the scoop so tell me what the hell you know about those three, because I know you know something. Maybe you even told me but lay it out for me again." Reno spun around on the barstool as Cloud pushed away from the counter and sat down on the couch, keeping his back to the slash on the wall. "Also," Reno continued on before Cloud could open his mouth, "You didn't blow up anymore reactors or do anything else I should probably be aware of while you were on leave, right?"
"No," Cloud said, but he wasn't looking at Reno either. The red head wasn't sure if he should be suspicious or if Cloud was just being his usual socially stunted self. Before he could decide Cloud went on. "The three are Remnants. I'm not sure where they came from or how they got here, but I've fought them before."
"Remnants of Sephiroth?" Reno asked bluntly.
"Yes."
"That explains the eerie similarities. But Sephiroth's not dead so where they'd come from and what do they want?" Reno got up and started to rustle through the refrigerator for more food. He couldn't see Cloud's expression but he was sure it was in turns pained and angry. Cloud always got like that when talking about the past.
"I don't know, but they want Jenova. They call her Mother—"
"So that's what that meant. The reports mentioned it," Reno interrupted.
"Right. Mother."
"So wait, then Sephiroth is the brother?" When Reno poked his head above the fridge door he saw that Cloud was glaring at the floor like he wanted to put another hole in it.
"They said brother?" the blond asked stiffly.
"Yeah," Reno replied, brushing off Cloud's mood. He was used to this by now.
Cloud shook his head and walked back to the bedroom. Reno was about to follow with the sandwich he'd stolen, when he came back out with a sword. It wasn't a typical buster sword either, Reno realized. There were multiple swords involved and the whole affair was significantly fancier and more complicated than any sword Reno had ever seen.
"What is that?" he asked, awed.
"My sword. What did they say about a brother?"
Reno forced himself to stop eyeing the assortment of swords that made that one sword and concentrate. "Only that they had one. It's Sephiroth right? Or…" Reno squinted suspiciously. "Or you?"
"Not me anymore," Cloud said flatly.
"Right," Reno said, rocking back on his heels and letting that go for now. "Do they know that though?" Cloud remained silent, which meant he didn't know of course. "With your luck the General and Zack are gonna find out that by brother they mean you and then you're screwed. Again."
"They already think I know something."
"Because they're not stupid I guess," Reno said, unsurprised. Cloud had really screwed this whole thing up with his secrets. "Okay, and these Remnants want Jenova why? Too much to hope it's to kill her too."
"They want her to ride this planet around the universe looking for other planets to destroy."
Cloud said this so matter-of-factly that Reno actually wanted to laugh before he realized how serious Cloud was being.
"You're joking."
"No."
"I thought she wanted to destroy the world? That's what evil Sephiroth wanted, right?"
"Sephiroth was dead. She used what was left of him as a puppet," Cloud said sharply, turning away to pack a bag with materia and ration bars. "She wanted to destroy our world since the Cetra destroyed her a millennia ago, and then ride it around the universe as eternal punishment."
"Well, at least we know exactly what she wants. Kinda creepy how you know that." Reno crammed the rest of the sandwich in his mouth.
"I—" Cloud paused for a millisecond. "Sephiroth talked." But Cloud wasn't remembering Sephiroth telling him, eyes rimmed in black from lack of sleep, speaking in a zealot's voice. He'd heard it somewhere else too. He could remember that sweet, aching voice in his head perfectly, urging him to help her, to make her happy in anyway possible. It was the same voice Sephiroth had been hearing.
"Okay, so we've established that there are three mini-Sephiroth's trying to find Jenova and do her bidding. And now Sephiroth himself is going after them."
"Yes."
"Right," Reno said, waiting for Cloud to interject how terrible that was, and find some way to drag Sephiroth back here into safety. Cloud didn't though. "Isn't that bad?"
"Yes."
Reno waited. Cloud continued to pack supplies and moved to Zack's room to pack whatever was in there. Reno followed him, but he didn't know if he could actually wait the blond out. But Cloud continued to stuff the bag with a few layers stolen from Zack's closet, pounding everything down into the pack like he could pound away his own weaknesses if he tried hard enough.
"So we're bringing Sephiroth and Zack in?" Reno finally asked as Cloud proved to be perfectly capable of ignoring him for the rest of the day.
"No!" Cloud said sharply, and when he glared up at Reno the Turk realized just how mako-bright those eyes were now. "I need more mako and the rest of First Tsurugi and then I'll take care of the Remnants. I've fought them before, I know how to beat them."
Cloud's hands shook as he zipped up the bag, and with his eyes so bright it made the circles under them look even worse. He always seemed so steady, but Cloud would be the first to admit that it was all a mess under that thin veneer of control. Reno could see the façade cracking at the mention of mako.
"Where are the other syringes?" the red head asked, warning bells in his head going off. Really they should have been going off long ago, but he'd been ignoring it despite years on the streets teaching him better.
"Gone," Cloud said shortly.
"And now you need more?"
Cloud shrugged.
"You sound like… like, damnit, a druggy, Cloud," Reno said. He'd been unconsciously avoiding the moniker, but now with the shakes and the eyes and Cloud's desperation it was the only word that fit. "You want to keep taking mako and you don't want help. And it's not good for you. Look at what it's doing to you."
"I'm not addicted to mako," Cloud ground out dangerously, standing stock still now. He wanted nothing more than to stop talking about it. Every time he thought about taking more of it he wanted to be sick.
"It's a drug," Reno argued, "Like a super steroid. And trust me, some of those beef-bags at Bro's gym can't do anything without shooting it up."
"I'm not—"
"I know how it is, Cloud, even done it a few times myself. You feel powerful, on top of the world, and when the lows hit and that tremble starts up in your pinky finger you gotta stop. Can't believe I didn't say this before," Reno went on. He'd known a lot of junkies growing up, and no speech had ever made them stop, but Reno couldn't catch the words as they tumbled out of him. He wasn't letting Cloud go down this road. He wasn't.
Cloud's hands were clenched on his bag, no longer shaking by pure force of will. "I don't want to take it," he finally said, staring at the floor so hard he wouldn't even blink. "If you think it's bad enough to watch fifty-two people be slaughtered once, it's worse to relive a plate falling and crushing thousands of people, or burning towns, or laying on the lab table, or friends—" Cloud stopped short from saying anything more. He made himself relive those things by taking those injections. Maybe he was punishing himself, but it didn't feel like it. He took mako because the real punishment would be watching the whole thing repeat itself.
"That's what… but I thought…" Reno had only had the small Turk injections, and he'd felt like he was thrumming with energy afterwards, but Cloud… Suddenly his impassioned speech about habits and power-highs sounded stupidly ignorant.
Cloud didn't say anymore, but he didn't have to.
When Cloud glanced up again, Reno had his hands up in surrender. "Okay, fine, you don't want to take it but you do. I get it. I've seen some shit that I wouldn't take a nightmare drug to relive even if—" Reno stopped, realizing of course that Cloud was doing it to save his friends, the self-sacrificing bastard, and Reno couldn't undermine that. "What I mean under all that is, I don't want to watch you go down because you're too bullheaded to change. Trust me, a lot of guys die with their pride holding them back."
Hearing Reno say that made Cloud shift his weight and look at him. Reno had been a surprisingly good friend and shockingly loyal, and it was hard to hold his genuinely concerned gaze. Cloud's eyes dropped to Reno's shirt. "Reno… I am—"
Cloud stopped. Pinned beneath one of the Turk's buttons was a tiny little chip. "What is that?"
"What?" Reno asked.
Cloud reached out and touched the offending hardware.
"Is that a—Fuck. Fuck shit damnit," Reno started to curse, yanking the chip off his shirt and immediately electrifying it with his nightstick until they could both smell burning metal. "Goddamnit that was a bug. Who the hell would bug me? Fuck, I need to get back to the Turks and find out who did this. Our whole conversation…"
Behind Cloud's eyes the shutters went down again and the moment was over. Whatever softness had slipped out was pulled back behind the wall. "Contain it," Cloud ordered, grabbing his stuff. He shouldered First Tsurugi and headed down the hall to the door.
"If that was Tseng—"
Cloud stopped before he reached the door. "You know what, it doesn't really matter," he said. "If Tseng finds out then, whatever. Don't let him get in my way."
"You know I'd probably push him in your way," Reno admitted. "More importantly, what if that was your First buddies?"
"I…" Cloud had been so firm before about not telling them, but doubts were creeping in. He almost told Reno that, but… no. If that was Sephiroth and Zack bugging Reno then it was over and he didn't have to worry about it. If it wasn't them, fine, he wasn't talking.
"It doesn't matter." Cloud shook his head and left.
One train trip and a long walk from the station to Sector 7, and Cloud found himself back outside Aeris' church. He didn't know if she would be there or whether he even wanted to see her, but he had a feeling about this place anyway. It had always been special, and maybe that's how Cloud knew one of the pieces would be here.
The doors creaked open slowly as Cloud pushed them open and walked in. His eyesight was much sharper now, so the colors of the flowers were brighter than before against the brown of the pews and the grey of the stone. What drew his eye though wasn't the mix of gold and white petals or the watering can glistening in the corner. It was the glinting silver of another piece of his sword.
It was the hollow blade, the one that combined with the main one to give First Tsurugi the classic shape of a buster sword. It was jammed into the stone of the alter where Galatine had come to a final rest before. For a moment Cloud thought Aeris would come in to offer some commentary on the symbolism, but the church remained empty and quiet, barely a whisper through the flowers as Cloud walked closer and claimed his blade.
This one was lighter than the others and served sometimes as his main sword if the main part of First Tsurugi was elsewhere. It felt easy and natural in his hands as he swung it in a few arcs, and Cloud felt himself smile for a moment before he locked it into place with the others. It was almost complete, only the side blades missing. Cloud ran his fingers along the interlocking swords and felt a little surer that he was doing the right thing.
Then his PHS started to ring.
"Cloud," Vincent said, his usual low timber rumbling along the line. "I reached Fort Condor before the SOLDIER investigators the day before. It's not good."
Cloud considered heading back out of the church and towards the exit of Midgar, but with another glance at the flowers and then the door, he sat down in a pew instead.
"And?"
"They have materia and summons, and from the scale of the destruction and wound patterns, they're fighting it at First Class level or higher."
"I know that Vincent," Cloud replied.
"They've left the area, and I've lost track of them. I don't advise going one-on-three."
Cloud leaned forward to put his hands on his knees and stared down at his boots.
"I have to."
"Leave it to the SOLDIERs."
"They'll be dead."
"Sephiroth is coming."
"…That's even worse."
Vincent didn't respond though, and Cloud couldn't think of anything to say. He knew Vincent was right, just as he knew that Reno was probably right too, but what they also said felt so wrong.
"There was AVALANCHE before," Vincent said.
"I fought the Remnants alone." Cloud had, but only briefly. His fight with Kadaj and later Kadaj-turned-Sephiroth had been alone, but Loz and Yazoo hadn't been there. With all three of them could he handle it? If the three had been attacking him together up on the remains of Shinra Headquarters AVALANCHE probably would have jumped out of the airship to help.
But he didn't have AVALANCHE here. He had Vincent and Reno, neither of whom would be enough backup to take on the three. It was up to him again unless he risked Sephiroth and Zack. It was the same crossroads he always seem to end up at.
"I have to go." Cloud hung up.
He was just leaving the church and plotting his next steps when his PHS rang yet again. Cloud flipped it open tiredly and signed whne he saw Reno's name. It rang almost to voicemail before he finally answered.
"Yo Cloud, not great news but not the worst. Found out who bugged me." Cloud didn't make a noise one way or the other, so after a beat Reno went on. "It was Rude. Can't trust Turks man, or at least, sort of." There was some whispering happening in the background that was muffled, likely by Reno's hand. "Anyway, he heard everything, and wants an explanation. I, uh, had to kind of tell him."
"…"
"So right, yeah, uh, look, Rude's not a leap-o-faith sort of fellow if you get me, but he does have something you want. Make a trade, basically?"
"What does he want?" Cloud asked, wondering if Rude had the answer to this all along. Did he know where Jenova was? Surely it wasn't that simple.
"Answers. He's got First Class mako—four tubes of it—if you want it." Reno sounded less than thrilled by the trade Cloud was being offered, but it was more than enough for Cloud to jump on. Answers were easy, getting First Class mako wasn't. He wasn't going to ask how Rude had some.
"What does he know about Jenova?"
"Less than I do." Reno's voice moved away from the phone to confirm with Rude. "Yeah, that name doesn't ring a bell. You did say those experiments were awhile ago though."
"I'll be there in thirty."
Cloud hung up and boarded the next train for Shinra HQ. When he reached Reno's rooms twenty-five minutes later, Rude was standing by the window with his hands held behind his back like private security, and Reno was flinging rubber bands across the room at a poster of Rufus Shinra.
"Yo, Cloud," Reno greeted. Cloud dropped his bag but didn't remove First Tsurugi.
Rude didn't say anything and neither did Cloud, so after an awkward second Reno started off. "Well, I told Rude about Jenova making Sephiroth go crazy and destroy shit and want to ride the planet into another planet. And also how you and a later version of AVALANCHE basically chased him down and killed him and Jenova. And, uh, how you went back in time and stuff. You know, the big things."
Cloud looked at Rude as Reno finished and started fishing for more rubber bands. Rude seemed to measure him in a long look before he spoke.
"Tell me again."
Cloud had no desire to rehash the whole story in detail, so he kept it brief. Throughout the retelling Reno fiddled with his PHS as he laid on the bed in his rumpled suit and Rude watched Cloud talk behind his shades. The story sounded as dry as possible for such an epic adventure in Cloud's voice, but he didn't care if Rude was entertained, only that he'd be useful.
"Then I woke up here, not long after stopping the second Reunion."
Rude seemed to think for some time on what Cloud said. "Only Reno knows?" he finally asked, not giving away whether he believed a word of it or not.
Cloud shrugged. He wasn't going to mention Vincent to a Turk, even if Reno trusted Rude. If Rude wasn't above bugging Reno for information, than he wasn't above telling Veld about Vincent and complicating everything.
"You're going to kill the Remnants and Jenova?" Rude confirmed slowly.
"That's about the size of it," Reno agreed, leaning back on the bed with his arms behind his head. "I've been helping him sneak around, get information, hide from the General and Zack, you know."
"Hide?"
"If Sephiroth gets involved they'll be questions—the same ones he asked before he went mad," Cloud said, almost asking for a challenge to that assertion. "Zack would tell Sephiroth whatever he learned."
Rude didn't respond to that, but he was that kind of Turk. He assessed and analyzed but didn't make comments or try to change minds. Those were things Tseng was good at. Reno was brash and loud, a good balance to Rude's composure. Still, that cool gaze behind his ever-present sunglasses silently judging his decisions made Cloud want to turn around and leave.
"Right, that's it," Cloud finished lamely.
"Proof?"
"Have you ever seen Cloud pick up a sword?" Reno asked lazily from the bed.
Cloud considered Rude. "I know why the President is obsessed with the Ancients."
Reno sat up. "He is?"
Rude didn't blink or shift.
"He wants to find the Promised Land and an endless supply of mako."
"That's a fairytale," Reno snorted, lying back down.
"He let Hojo kidnap a Cetra and her daughter, and when she escaped they shot her to death. The daughter's been hunted ever since."
"Whoa," Reno said, sitting back up.
"Triple classified status," Rude said. "And a project on hold."
"It won't be on hold in five years if I fail," Cloud warned.
Rude didn't respond for several long seconds. Finally the man glanced at Reno before turning back to him.
"You still need mako?"
"Yes," Cloud said roughly. He didn't want to repeat himself about the experimentations or what they had involved. He'd skated that in his explanation, and Reno could fill Rude in if he liked. The less Cloud thought about those years the better.
Rude pulled out a small case from an inside pocket of his suit and tossed it to Cloud. It looked like a cigar case, but when he cracked it open four vials of mako were inside, all swirling with green color. Cloud snapped it shut quickly so he wouldn't be sick.
No one said thanks. Reno rolled his eyes on the bed, thinking that he had to do everything around here.
"Alright, now that Rude's in the know maybe he can find out where this Jenova thing is. The latest from the General's mission is that the Triplets have left Fort Condor and they're tracking them now."
Cloud wanted to say that they wouldn't find them, but he couldn't give Vincent away. He remained silent instead and let Reno go on.
"If we're lucky the General will take them out before they talk and that'll be one problem solved. For now though, what are you going to do with those?" Reno nodded at the slim case in Cloud's hands. "That's potent stuff, the kind they shower with. It's not inject-able."
"I can get you access to a shower," Rude offered after a moment.
"That is such a bad idea," Reno said immediately, but Cloud ignored him.
"Where?"
"Private Turk one. Mostly unused."
Cloud narrowed his eyes. That was convenient.
"Rude's angle is not wanting the whole world to be destroyed," Reno explained.
"Except we're not keeping the Shinra Company," Cloud said, daring Rude to say otherwise. "It's entirely Shinra's fault we're even here."
"Shinra is an employer," Rude acknowledged.
"One that demands absolute loyalty," Cloud argued.
Reno stood up now, this time apparently done with the posturing Cloud and Rude were subtly doing. "Look Cloud, as a Turk you do some real shit for Shinra, and Rude's been here a long time. Bet he knows a lot more about what the Science Department gets up to than most anyone else." Rude adjusted his sunglasses, almost like he was embarrassed. Reno continued on heedlessly. "And thing is, once you're employed by Shinra there ain't any leaving. Someone like a Turk with those skills? Veld'll put a bullet in your head first."
"Forceful retirement," Rude coughed.
SOLDIER was the same; no SOLDIER could just leave. They were property of Shinra in the fine print, a science experiment unwelcome on the masses except to stop riots and inspire worship. Shinra would pay any wage raise, fulfill any leave request or mission desire, so long as the SOLDIER stayed. And if they left anyway they hunted them down—the way Angeal and Genesis had been. So Cloud got where Rude was coming from now. He could work with people motivated by self-interest. It wasn't AVALANCHE, but Reno had proven to be worth it.
"Okay, where's the shower?"
Reno had accused Cloud of being a drug addict without realizing what mako did to him. Shakes, stealing, threats if he told anyone, demands for more and higher quality—Cloud did all those things, and that's what anyone addicted to a drug did. Of course, Reno hadn't realized until Cloud told him that mako didn't give him a high; it didn't make him feel so good and so powerful that he never wanted to come down.
What it did was so much worse.
Cloud vomited before the shower even turned on, standing naked and trembling as he waited like he expected a mudslide not a shower. Rude had loaded one of the vials of mako into the mechanism that would pour it on to Cloud. The mako would be mixed with a chemical combination to help it be absorbed by the skin, so Cloud would have to stand under the spray for four minutes. Reno didn't realize how torturous that was going to be until the screams.
Even Rude looked surprised by Cloud's reaction as the blond huddled in on himself, screams bouncing off the tile until it was deafening. They eventually stopped and turned into choked noises that were almost worse. Rude had to grab Reno by the back of his suit jacket to stop him from opening the door.
Into the second minute Cloud kept shuddering, and Reno wasn't sure if Cloud was crying or going into shock, his face tucked into his knees. He slowly fell down to the floor and lay there sprawled, with his head ticking occasionally in an unnatural way. By the third minute Cloud's eyes were open but he was staring emptily forward with no reaction to the spray still pounding down on him, making his skin turn a strange green hue, and Reno had to look away.
"This isn't normal," Rude said.
"Cloud is so far from normal that he makes the General look downright average sometimes. I can't look at this. He looks like…" Reno didn't know the word, but after a minute Rude said it.
"A doll."
Cloud had called himself a puppet before, and now Reno could see it. It was bad enough to watch, so how horrific was it to be reliving that?
At four minutes the shower sputtered out. They had to wait one minute for enough mako steam inside the room to drop from dangerous levels, otherwise Reno and Rude risked exposure too.
When Rude's watch finally ticked over, Reno yanked the door open and crouched by Cloud, who was still sitting on the floor like an abandoned toy. "Cloud, hey, Cloud?"
Cloud's head tilted up slowly, his eyes having trouble focusing. "Reno?"
"Yeah man, it's me. C'mon Cloud, let's get out of here."
Cloud cooperated well enough, standing up and seemingly unaware of how cool the locker room was or his nudity. Rude draped a towel around him that Cloud didn't acknowledge at all. Reno sat him down and handed him his clothes. Cloud had to be cajoled into putting something on, but he refused anything more than a t-shirt and boxers, not even pants because they itched.
"We should have asked him what to expect," Reno said, feeling very much like fretting, a state of mind he never wanted to be in again. When someone drank too much he rolled them on their side and counted their breaths per minute as they slept. When someone drugged themselves into a stupor he propped them up on the couch and crossed his fingers because no ambulances came to Wall Market. But when Cloud did so much mako so hard that he basically went comatose? Reno actually considered calling the emergency number before he remembered that Shinra handled all emergency services.
"He said to leave him alone to handle it," Rude answered, though he adjusted his cufflinks, which gave away how uncomfortable the situation made him. The two Turks stepped away as Cloud stared blankly into space. He didn't react to snapping fingers, clapping by his ears, or even a hard poke. Nothing.
"This can't be okay. This is stronger than the other stuff. What if it's mako poisoning?"
Rude shook his head. Both of them knew that mako poisoning wasn't considered reversible. Reno leaned forward with his hands on his knees and groaned.
"Cloud, c'mon yo, the General's gonna kill me slowly if you die in a damn locker room cuz I gave you too much mako. Cloud."
Cloud's head turned a fraction towards Reno, like he was hearing his voice faintly down a long corridor. Any reaction was better than none though, and Reno actually barked a laugh of relief.
"Not poisoned then. Just… just drugged out of his mind. Any idea how long this will last?"
Rude shook his head.
"Any idea when the General gets back?"
Rude shook it again.
"Well we got until he gets back," Reno said, satisfied for the moment. "See if he doesn't wake up a bit more then we'll move him to my place."
Relieved, Rude took up a position at the door and Reno puttered around the small locker room so he didn't have to look at Cloud, opening lockers and picking locks to poke at people's stuff. Cloud continued to sit like a zombie through all this.
Reno found a lot of sweaty gym gear, some porn magazines, someone who was definitely into buff guys with glasses, and a pile of melted chocolate coins. The next one he opened had something even more random in it. "Hey Rude, come look at this. A megaphone!" Rude glanced over to see Reno speaking into the phone aimed at a locker, creating an echo that reverberated around the bank of lockers. Rude glanced at Cloud who hadn't twitched even though his hearing must be incredibly sensitive now, then adjusted his glasses.
"Maybe not a good idea," he said.
Reno flipped Rude the finger and kept rummaging, holding on to the megaphone. Rude watched exasperated, but he didn't move away from the door.
Somewhere between watching Reno and listening to the bangs of slammed locker doors Cloud vanished.
The only doors in the locker room were the one Rude was blocking and the one to the mako shower. It took Reno and Rude precious minutes to find out that Cloud was in neither the shower nor any of the lockers, and by the time Reno identified the off-kilter vent cover that had been behind Cloud's bench, the blond was long gone.
"How the hell did he know that was there?" Reno asked, peering up into the cavernous black of the air vent. "He used vents in the exam, but how did he know Shinra HQ had the same ones?"
"He broke into the HQ before," Rude reminded. Cloud had mentioned briefly storming the HQ to save a teammate and finding the President dead.
Reno pulled his head out of the hole and the Turks shared a look. Rude looked down at himself, his broad shoulders and muscled arms, and looked back at Reno. Reno glanced down at himself, only to remember that he was a skinny, underfed idiot who was about to climb into the air vents after Cloud.
"Shit, this job sucks. I'm gonna murder Cloud myself when this is over. Thought I was done with air vents," he muttered as he clambered up into the space.
Cloud had actually only gone as far as the next room over before climbing out of the vents. He needed to get to the highest floor where President Shinra was. If Sephiroth hadn't killed the President yet then he would, and Cloud could confront him there. If not, Rufus would be showing up too with his trained cat again.
Cloud made it to the elevators only to realize that he was missing the keycards. He shrugged his shoulders and decided to run up the stairwell, glad that he was feeling so well rested now. He didn't know where this energy in his muscles was coming from, but it made running up thirty more stories easy.
At the top though, Cloud realized that the door access didn't open to the balcony and helipad that circled around the President's office. Instead he was on top of it, on a roof covered in air conditioning equipment, PHS towers, and an assortment of cigarette butts.
"Bit chilly for a t-shirt and shorts," Reeve said, gaze flicking over Cloud. "And no shoes."
Cloud could almost feel his brain switch gears as the hallucination shifted, but the transition was so smooth he forgot immediately why he'd climbed all this way in the first place.
"Reeve," he grunted.
The executive put out his cigarette and donned his gloves. He didn't recognize the SOLDIER in the blue uniform, but his eyes were feverishly bright, which was unnerving. "I can't say we've met before."
The blond SOLDIER rolled his shoulders and ignored him, moving to the edge of the roof. He glanced down at the lights and activity below indifferently. "Shouldn't have let Neo-Shinra happen," he commented.
"Pardon?"
"Reno and the other Turks…" the SOLDIER trailed off, sounding confused.
Reeve didn't know what to make of this baffling conversation, but he latched on to the one understandable thing. "You know Reno?"
The SOLDIER shrugged again. He wasn't very good at conversing.
"I know him a little myself. He's loyal," Reeve offered, testing whether the blond liked Reno or not. He was clearly in the middle of a fit, and Reeve knew morally he shouldn't be taking advantage of this, but he and Reno hadn't spoken in a long time, and he still had a lot of questions for the redhead. Another's perspective might be helpful.
The SOLDIER snorted. "That's his job. Turks got a finger in every dirty pie of Shinra's."
"Reno's different."
The blond shrugged, walking away from the edge and over to the other side of the roof, uncaring of his bare feet and the broken bottles and cigarette butts that littered the small area.
"You must know some of the dirt of Shinra too," Reeve tried, since subtlety obviously wasn't working. The blond was too far gone in a haze to probably register much of what was happening let alone remember any of this.
He snorted derisively. "I am the dirt of Shinra."
Reeve waited for him to go on, but he sat there and brooded over that instead.
"I'd think a high-class SOLDIER would be the pride of Shinra."
"SOLDIER's just a science experiment," the blond muttered.
"A successful one," Reeve countered.
"That's because all the failures are released into the desert."
Reeve paused. He knew the Science Department dabbled in a lot of things, including pharmaceuticals, military technology, even genome projects. But what this blond SOLDIER was implying…
"Are you saying some SOLDIERs fail?"
Cloud turned and glared at Reeve. "You saw them. Hell, we fought them. Through Cait Sith. The ones that didn't crystallize and die in the mako vats got loose. And Hojo lets them go when he runs out of space."
Reeve choked and fumbled the cigarette box he'd been casually holding. This SOLDIER knew about Cait Sith and was saying Hojo made monsters?
"Did Reno tell you about Cait Sith?" Reeve asked, because he knew Shinra went to unimaginable lows, but actually breeding monsters? What purpose did that serve? Certainly it didn't make them money, which was all Reeve ever thought the company did anything for. Except, of course, Hojo, who desired what? To be a god?
Cloud rolled his head over his shoulders like they ached and didn't answer.
Reeve, meanwhile, vowed to review the tapes of Cait Sith's excursion to the labs and possibly change his mission. If Shinra really was making monsters, than what other underbelly full of secrets were they hiding? And how had this Third found out about all this?
When Reeve looked up again, the SOLDIER was gone.