The barrels of the Turk's gun spin up, the motor revving and sending rounds whistling through the air.

Zack shoves Cloud toward the nearest ladder and jumps over the catwalk railing with the medic on his back. They land in a puddle of mystery fluid, which quickly soaks into Zack's shoes.

"You have the worst luck on the planet," Cloud says.

"Tell me about it."

Zack surveys the dark jungle of pods and pipes. If not for the rain of bullets sparking on the catwalk overhead, he'd have no idea which way to go. The pods are a maze, crammed seemingly wherever the floor is level enough to mount them. No lines, no paths. He hikes the SOLDIER higher on his back and steps tentatively forward.

A bestial roar shakes dust from the ceiling. The Turk's barrage shatters the glass of a dozen specimen pods.

"So this looks bad," he says lightly.

"More like doomed." Cloud shakes water from his hand with a pinched look on his face. "Plan?"

"Rush the door?"

Cloud scans the walkway, and comes to the same conclusion as him. "Long sight lines, no room to move—"

"Death trap," Zack nods.

A pod just a few meters away takes a direct hit to the mako port and explodes, sending shrapnel and liquid mako everywhere. The lids of the whole cluster pop open at once.

"He's either the worst shot I've ever seen, or he's doing that on purpose."

"Drawing us out," Cloud says. He wades to one of the catwalk's support beams and gives it his back. "Can't fight in the water down here, can't get cover up there."

"Death trap," Zack repeats. "Okay, new plan. Divide and conquer. You take the stiff and sneak along the low road. I'll hop the catwalk and draw fire. We meet on the other side, scan his face, and lock the door behind us."

"Good plan, in theory."

The Turk's fire cuts off abruptly. In Zack's experience, that gives him three to five seconds before the suit starts issuing lukewarm taunts. He leans the medic's body against a nearby pod and draws his sword.

It's a standard Class C weapon, weighted to compensate for a SOLDIER's strength but not enough for him. It'll be awkward, but fast. Good enough to keep him in the fight. He jumps back to the base of the ladder and rests his foot on the bottom rung.

"See you on the other side, buddy. Don't get eaten."

Cloud eyes the pack of creatures climbing out of the recently exploded pods, and tests the medic's weight with his good arm. He does a good impression of bravado.

"You too. Don't get shot." Lifting the medic in one arm, Cloud starts hopping from pod to pod and Zack makes himself focus on the ladder and the Turk waiting at the top. Right on cue, the suit struts down the walkway with his arms open in challenge.

"Yoohoo, where'd you slimy lab rats go? I thought we were gonna play."

"Right here, asshole." Zack jumps the last bit of the ladder and spins the sword into a close guard, the blade outstretched with the hilt against his hip. The Turk sniffs and spits over the edge, his fists rising into a boxing stance.

Metal glints from the knuckles of his fingerless gloves, which means the guy won't be any less dangerous at close range. An armored punch is still preferable to a bullet, so Zack decides to close the gap.

He jumps onto the catwalk railing and pushes off, launching himself to the top of a bank of pods. They form a zig-zag line of stepping stones alongside the catwalk, which will hopefully help him cover the distance without taking hits.

Gunfire follows his path, cracking and dinging across glass and metal and thudding into the cavern wall. Dust and rocks explode from the impacts, and so he slides down the edge of the next capsule to get his bearings through the glass.

At least a dozen creatures stalk the catwalk, while another fifteen or twenty ram their bodies against bullet-pocked glass that's cracked but still holding.

The creature inside the pod he's clinging to rears up. It has a veiny, canine body and shark-like teeth. Zack cringes as it opens its wide mouth and screams, hot breath fogging the glass and spewing flecks of oily saliva inches from his face.

The barrel of the Turk's gun pivots to the noise.

"Hiding again," he jeers. "Thought you were supposed to be some 1st Class hotshot."

Zack doesn't care what he thinks, so long as he's not pointing that gun at Cloud.

The minigun revs up again. Concentrated fire pounds the other side of the tube, breaking through and ripping the dog into a chunky spray of blood and brains. It splatters on the glass, followed shortly by the impacts of ten copper shells the size of Zack's thumbs.

Cracks spiderweb out from the points of impact, and he knows it's time to go. Pulling hard, he flings himself back on top of the pod just in time for the glass walls to fail. The lid collapses onto the base with a sickening crash, and then he's staring down six barrels with no cover.

"Gotcha, punk," the Turk growls. He extends his hands, and now Zack can see a pair of triggers built into the brass knuckles covering his fists.

Metal armature disappears under his suit cuffs, presumably connecting them to the gun's shoulder mount and offering him enhanced strength and body armor.

Fingers tighten on the twin triggers. "Say goodbye."

Zack crouches, hiding behind his blade even though it's not nearly wide enough. He braces for the sting of metal puncturing skin and the tight, breathless feeling that always hits just before the pain. Instead, the air shifts, and a blur of navy streaks from a ladder to the Turk's left.

"Not today," Cloud growls, landing a solid punch to the jaw. The Turk flies over the edge and tumbles down to a hard landing in the drink.

Zack blinks over the edge of his blade, and starts laughing deliriously. "The hell was that?"

"Path's blocked, had to come up." Cloud shrugs. He shakes out his fist, his mouth thin and unhappy under incandescent eyes. "Haven't you heard of cover?"

"Where's the SOLDIER?" Zack counters, not really wanting to explain himself. His partner nods to the ladder, where a ruckus of snarls and growls can be heard.

"Couldn't get him up the ladder with my stupid arm. It's weird, the monsters only want me. I dropped him and they walked right by."

Sure enough, when Zack looks over the edge he sees the medic's body slumped against an I-beam unharmed. Not two meters away, a pack of thorny beasts are clawing their way up a stack of capsules to reach Cloud on the catwalk.

"We need him," Zack says. "I'll run down and—"

A wave of energy ripples to his left. The words dry on his tongue.

As one, he and Cloud turn to the pull, their heightened senses amplifying what would be a subtle shift of air into a whip crack of gathering power.

Blue light beams up from the mire, passing the catwalk to drill into the ceiling of the cavern. An array of sigils forms a circle around the beam, letters of an arcane language long forgotten.

Zack grabs Cloud by the elbow and dives for the ladder just as a six-legged horse with an armored rider materializes in midair. It holds a wicked longsword, poised to swing. The ladder cleaves in two while they're still on it, and sends them both tumbling.

"What in the hell—"

"Shit, fuck, shit—" Zack fights the water to stand, sloshing and splattering as he drags Cloud up and pushes him hard away. "Run!"

He rushes the medic. Algae coats the ground and threatens to topple him, but he doesn't slow down until his wet hands are slipping and sliding over the guy's limp arms. He jerks the medic onto his shoulder and straightens up.

Water slaps and sloshes as someone else does the same, a few meters away. Through the hissing, sparking skyline of damaged pods, the Turk aims his gun.

There's no time to plan, no intended destination. He needs to get out of the Turk's sight, and he can't move fast in the water. A shrill equine whinny stabs at his eardrums and turns all other sound to muffled warbling. He bends his knees and jumps.

Momentum propels him onto the slanted remains of the catwalk, and his wet shoes slide out from under him. He falls, skin scraping painfully against the rough metal grating. His hand finds a sheared-off rail. Everything lurches to a stop, and he grunts from the whiplash.

The medic's body slides from his shoulders, and then he's faced with a split-second choice—the sword in his hand or the medic on his back. One would keep him safe, the other is the key to freedom. He digs hard into the ribbed fabric of the SOLDIER's shirt, and watches the sword plunge into dark water.

There's no time to interrogate the decision. Bullets rattle the underside of the catwalk. He ignores them, concentrating wholly on delivering his human cargo to the blast door and leaving this hellhole behind.

He builds a fragile hope in his mind as he climbs, a vision of the next few minutes in which everything somehow goes right and he takes Cloud as far away as their tired legs can carry them.

They'll steal some supplies, avoid the cities, and set up camp somewhere warm. Cloud can build the fire while Zack ignores the instructions to the tent and sets it up completely wrong. Trading jabs, they'll agree to call it a wash and spread out their bedrolls under the stars. Crickets will chirp, and they'll trade campfire stories far into the night, solid and safe at each other's sides.

The sight of the summon landing on the catwalk between him and freedom shatters that hope to oblivion.

The horse's many hooves shuffle, impatient to run and rear but being held still by the stern hand of the rider. As a child he'd heard legends of Odin, but he never expected to find his worth weighed by the mighty king's gaze.

Powerful as he's become in SOLDIER, Zack knows he's no match for a god. He stands before him, shivering and dripping, all the mako in his veins no more useful than a child's wooden sword.

The summon raises his blade. Fear chills Zack's bones. Then, through the pillars of the horse's legs, he sees Cloud clamber up a ladder.

"Hey, ugly!" A soaked slipper hits the god in the back of the helmet. The summon turns.

"Cloud—"

"Get out of here, go!" His friend yells, and jumps down the other side of the catwalk. Odin whips his reins and the horse gives chase.

Zack shouts his name again, leaning over the rail to gape at the chaos below.

Cloud is on the run, jumping between the tops of capsules while Odin's horse runs on thin air, his sword arcing in terrifying sweeps that cut indiscriminately through steel, pipes, and monstrous sinew.

The Turk is surrounded by beasts, trading clumsy blows with his fists and struggling to aim the gun at close range. With every missed shot he opens another canister, until the entire cave is teeming, vibrating with the volume of the experiments' collective roar.

Every fiber of his being is screaming at him to join the fray, but a SOLDIER stays on mission. The diamond cut of the catwalk grate beats a painful thumb through his feet as he bolts for the security console of the blast door.

Unlike before, the monsters stalking the catwalk take notice of him. Their noses twitch and sniff as he draws close and their tentacles flick with interest.

It's only then that he notices the pulsing warmth of blood dribbling from his forearms and knees where they'd scraped against the broken catwalk. It clicks like a lock in his head—Cloud's wound.

That's why they hadn't been interested in the medic. They only scented blood on Cloud. And now, they're scenting blood on him. None of them have eyes that Zack can see. They must hunt purely by smell.

Thinking fast, he throws the medic against the blast door and rips off his soaked shirt. He scrubs it over his wounds, coating it in blood.

The first of five humanoid mutants lunges for him, and he twists it into an armlock. He throws the neck of the shirt over its head and shoves it back at the other monsters. Their featureless faces lock onto it, and then pounce in a vicious tangle of teeth and claws.

Zack pushes his body hard, lungs fluttering and heart pounding as he jerks the SOLDIER up by his armpits and holds his lolling head over the scanner.

"Access denied. Scan unclear."

Cursing, he awkwardly shifts so his arms are looped under the guy's shoulders and contorts his hands to hold his eyes open at the same time.

"Access denied. Scan unclear."

"Damn it," he growls, and shoves the SOLDIER's stupid mullet hair out of his face.

Never has it felt so victorious to hear a machine beep. The interlocking halves of the blast door groan and grind as they separate, and relief crushes Zack like a rockslide. He drags the medic onto blessedly solid ground and lays him flat, sparing only a second to catch his breath.

The hallway looks the same as this morning, narrow and dim with two doors on one side and the washroom on the other. The bookcase door leading to the main lab hangs open, like the Turk had come through in a hurry.

Two more doors and the spiral stairs separate them from fresh mountain air. Adrenaline sings in his veins. They can make it. They really can make it.

With renewed resolve he runs back into the action, uncaring of the cannibalistic feast happening on the walkway or the raw mako gushing freely from shorn pipes into the water. Through the haze and carnage he spots blonde hair on the lower level and bounds down the broken catwalk without a moment's consideration.

Cloud is beaten, though he's surrounded by so many corpses it's hard to tell whose blood it is. He's putting up a furious resistance, punching and kicking and holding a swarm of mutated enemies back.

The summon is nowhere to be seen, but the Turk seems to have become dinner to a pack of feline creatures. Bloody handprints smear the glass of the capsule where he fell, his intestines ripped out and pulled taut between two cats' mouths in a grotesque tug-of-war. The spell probably fizzled when he died.

A standard-issue handgun lies on the ground next to him, the Shinra logo a shock of vibrant color in the darkness. Zack grabs it and checks the chamber, stumbling frantically through the knee-high water.

Locked and loaded, a handful of rounds left.

"Cloud, get down!"

Percussive blasts answer the call of his finger on the trigger. Pop, pop, pop. Two dogs go down. Neither is fatal, they're barely even hits. His hands are too shaky, his nerves utterly shot. The third round buries itself harmlessly in the wall.

"Damn it, why did you come back?" Cloud demands.

Zack doesn't have energy for Cloud's martyr complex right now. He fires until the hammer clicks against metal.

Three dogs remain, barking and snapping their jaws. The other two pounce on his back, sinking in teeth and mauling him with claws. Zack pushes his body past the limit, slipping and flailing in his rush to reach him.

It's the sort of fight he's only seen at war, or in the darkest gutters of Midgar. A harsh, brutal struggle to survive. He has eyes only for the dog's pointed teeth and Cloud's thrashing fists. His senses narrow, his vision tunnels.

Shrouded in the singular focus of protecting Cloud, he doesn't hear the sound of booted feet crashing into water. It's only when a powerful ice spell bursts into the air and freezes him in place that he notices the limping figure of the medic with his right hand raised.

Orbs of gaseous mako gather to him like insects to flame, the same preternatural blue-green as his SOLDIER eyes. With a snap of his fingers, the ice contracts and shatters.

Zack yelps, slamming into the now-frozen water and curling up in pain. Cloud skids and rolls nearby, landing in a bloody heap. The dogs whimper and scurry away.

"Well, this is a fine mess you've made, gentlemen," the medic says, "but I think it's time we end this dance."

He holds his arm straight out, and closes his hand into a fist. Materia shines from the bracer on his wrist, conjuring golden rings around them both. Between one blink and the next, he's trapped in the full-body paralysis of a Stop spell.

Apart from breathing and the small range in which he can move his eyes, he is utterly at the mercy of the SOLDIER he'd ambushed and dragged around the cavern like luggage. He can only watch in complete helplessness as the man clears a path to the far-off ladder with a battery of frost spells.

He comments idly on the damage and the state of the fallen Turk as he hauls Zack and Cloud up to the catwalk, one at a time, with surprising care. They're laid on their sides in the lab down the hall, him on the left and Cloud on the right.

The SOLDIER checks them over briefly, and administers shots into their necks with practiced smoothness. Zack starts to feel drowsy in a matter of seconds.

"Why, comrades, why would you do something so foolhardy?" The medic sighs regretfully. "I have no desire to bring harm to fellow SOLDIERs, but you've forced my hand tonight."

Unable to move, the two can only stare at each other. Cloud's face is trapped in a look of terrified resignation, Zack's a tight-jawed wince that's becoming outright painful to hold.

"I will have to inform Hojo," he continues. "Please, do not try anything foolish while I call him. I will be obligated to use lethal force."

Zack didn't think he'd be on his feet for a while, even if he still had the will to fight. This dose of sedative was definitely not a light one. The SOLDIER holsters his hypo, and gives them one final disapproving look. Then he strides out and bolts the door behind him.

Mutely they stare at each other, faces frozen but eyes vibrant with emotion.

It's over, those cold, blue eyes say.

Cloud's despair is incandescent. It's a kind of gravity pressing Zack into the floor, a noxious fire scorching his bones.

No. He tries to project back. No, not like this.

Tears pool in Cloud's eyes, and he can't say anything, can't look away. They etch a creeping, wet line across the bridge of his nose.

Zack's vision blots out, his eyes mirroring Cloud's. If his friend ever mentions it, he'll blame the sedative, maybe call it water from the cave, but the truth is he's spiraling. Defeat eats at his heart, one little bite at a time.

They miscalculated. They failed.

Hojo's gonna be pissed.