Zack XIX: Sunny weather

Zack was resting in his seat with his eyes closed, but the noise of the Gelnika made it hard for him to actually fall asleep. Close by, Cloud, the blonde infanterist he had first met at Modeoheim, was pacing around nervously in what little room there was in the passenger area of the large cargo plane. He had said he was motion sick and was trying to contain it as well as he could, at least while the plane was at cruising altitude. The seat beside Zack was empty and the next two seats were occupied by Rude and Reno. Rude was reading something on a tablet, while Reno was snoring softly, his head resting on Rude's shoulder. But Rude did not seem to mind.

Over the aisle, the remaining four seats were taken by four more infanterists. They had all taken off their helmets, but Zack did not recognize any of them besides Cloud.

Zack was roused from his doze by the beeping of his phone when they were still over the sea separating the eastern from the western continent. It was an unusually verbose message from Tseng updating him on Sephiroth. "Sephiroth is awake and better. Looks like he did manage to sleep it off for now. His wounds are recovered, too. He doesn't remember anything that happened yesterday aside from going to Hojo's and having lunch with you. I decided not to tell him how he was when we found him and I would like you to stick with that. I'll check up on him again later, but maybe it'd be good for him if you could talk to him, too. He's not going on any missions and I'm not sure if he has anything else to do. He might welcome some distraction. We'll join you in Wutai in two days." The news were both good and worrying, but for now, Zack contented himself by thanking Tseng for the update. He decided to wait until later and actually give Sephiroth a phone call after getting off the plane at Rocket Town. The noise of the plane would make it hard to talk anyway.

Only after he put away his phone, he noticed that Reno had taken over Cloud's seat and his head was now resting on Rude's lap while the bald man was looking at his tablet. "Wow, you guys are really close", Zack commented. "Hm", Rude said. At this point, Zack was not really surprised by anything anymore. Though it did not matter enough for him to pry. Besides, he was certain Rude would not say anything useful anyway. "Hey, how can you read with those shades on?" His shades were really dark and the light on the plane was dim. Why was he wearing them anyway? "I'm used to it", he responded curtly. Oh well. Maybe he was not reading anyway, but looking out the window instead. Who could tell? "How's the weather outside?" Rude looked up for a split second. "Sunny." Zack rolled his eyes.

He folded his arms and slid further down in his seat. He had not though of bringing anything to entertain himself on the flight during the trouble yesterday. And he got bored instantly, just thinking about the other flight the following day. The only saving grace was that the distance between Rocket Town and Wutai was considerably shorter. He had already pretty much caught up with his lack of sleep and was not feeling tired anymore. He looked around. Cloud was sitting on a crate, swaying back and forth. Apparently, he had given up on walking around. Zack got up, walked over to Cloud and bowed down to him. "Hey, how ya doing?" Cloud looked up at Zack with his clear, blue eyes. "I'm alright. As long as there are no turbulences." Zack nodded. "The noise is killing me! Hey, you wanna do squats with me?"

Zack felt a lot better when he eventually had to return to his seat for the landing near Rocket Town. Cloud had awkwardly participated in Zack's squatting exercises after he opened up about his failed attempt to join SOLDIER. After initially making fun of them, the other infanterists had decided to join in until Reno woke up and complained about the noise they were allegedly making. Zack had no idea how someone as lazy as Reno could have made it into the Turks. After Zack and Cloud had sat back down for the landing, Reno's head finally ended up back on Rude's shoulder, from where he was looking at the tablet together with him. Zack noticed Cloud observing at them shyly. Reno was quite attention-drawing with his spiky flaming red hair and pony tail, goggles on his forehead and his obvious uniform violation, which left half his chest exposed. Needless to say, he was not wearing a tie and had not neatly tucked his white shirt, either.

"They're not ashamed whatsoever", Zack said to Cloud, who blushed upon hearing what Zack was convinced he was thinking anyway. "Shut the fuck up!", Reno groaned. "What would I be ashamed about, huh?", to which Rude only nodded in agreement. Zack nodded in acknowledgement. "Good point!" Reno said something with a voice too low For Zack to understand, but Cloud, who was sitting directly next to Reno, hastily turned away and apologized in embarrassment.

The Gelnika was descending quickly at this point. Zack had been glad that the there was something to distract Cloud from the landing to potentially keep him from getting sick, but now that he was too embarrassed to watch the two Turks, he started staring at his own knees and clenching his fists. Zack poked him from the side. "Hey, you know, if you get sick easily, you should not look down. It'll make you worse." Cloud nodded and instead started staring up at the ceiling of the cabin.

Cloud needed a paper bag after all just before the plane's wheels touched the ground, and continued to look ill after they unboarded from the Gelnika. As they walked along the side of the bulky plane, workers already started unloading the cargo from the back. Rocket Town was the site where preparations for the first human space flight were currently underway and there were cargo and personnel flights going back and forth between there and Midgar all the time. The cargo their plane had transported was packed in wooden crates, so Zack could not tell what it was. They had landed at a considerable distance from the town and there were several large trucks and a small bus waiting to carry them and the goods to the town.

Cloud sighed at the sight of the bus. They had still not reached their destination, but Reno assured them that the ride would only take some 30 minutes. The scenery surrounding the narrow street they rode on was somewhat desolate, though green plains and steel-grey mountains were visible in the far distance, and the rocket pad and nearby town came into view fairly quickly as there was nothing blocking the line of sight. Zack was watching the approaching rocket in awe. He had seen a model of it in the exhibition hall at headquarters, but the sheer size of the rocket glistening in the sun made him wonder how such a thing could fly into space.

It was early afternoon when they finally reached the Town and checked into one of the guest houses the company was keeping ready on site for temporarily visiting scientists, soldiers, and other staff. They were to occupy double rooms, and Zack had agreed to share the room with Cloud. After storing their bags in the room, Zack finally took the opportunity to find a quiet spot and call Sephiroth, while Cloud, glad to be off of moving vehicles for the rest of the day, wanted to lie down and take a rest.