Hush Little Baby 4
Genre: gen, angst perhaps.
Rating: R for adult themes and swearing but nothing too graphic yet. Rating may change.
Warnings: Angst, mentions of violence, swearing, adult themes. Zack.
Summary: Zack has noticed a change in Cloud, but the blond won't say a word.
Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Final Fantasy 7, nor am I making any profit from this.
Part Four
Walking down the practically empty halls of Shinra, Cloud made as if to turn left, but frowned when he saw that Zack had stopped and seemingly had no intention of following.
“Zack, your room’s this way.” Cloud said weakly, nodding his head to the left, sounding so weary, as if he was praying that Zack had just forgotten, and was not planning to take him somewhere else.
The blonde’s tone almost made Zack give in out of sympathy, but then his sense came back to him, and he realised that, while Cloud may not like what he was about to do, it would help the boy in the long run.
“We’re not going to my room, Spiky.” The SOLDIER replied softly, taking a few small steps closer to Cloud. “We’re going to the medical centre.”
Cloud’s eyes immediately widened, and he backed up until he hit the wall, staring at Zack with a mixture of emotions on his face. The primary emotion was fear, Zack could tell, but he could also see anger, shock and suspicion in there as well.
“No way!” Cloud yelled, again hugging himself with his arms. “There’s no way that I’m going there. I don’t want to. I don’t want some doctor pawing me and prodding me. I don’t want to be touched by them! There is no way that I’m going to let them…look at me.”
“Cloud, you need to calm down.” Zack told him in a low tone, taking another step closer to Cloud and taking his arm gently.
The boy flinched, looking at Zack with wary eyes, looking as though he would bolt at any second.
Zack rubbed the boy’s arm soothingly, then brought his other hand up behind the other’s head, gently guiding Cloud to look at him.
“Cloud, please, they aren’t going to hurt you, the doctor’s job is to help you. They won’t do you any harm.” Zack reasoned, his tone still soft and calm, his hand still stroking, in hopes that the methods used to calm chocobo’s also worked on humans.
Cloud simply shook his head, and folded his arms more tightly around himself in a death grip. His eyes shone with a feral look, and Zack actually felt a little uneasy.
“Cloud, be reasonable.” Zack begged softly. “I at least want you to get someone to look at those burns; you scalded yourself in that shower. Please, that’s all I want for now, and then we can deal with…other matters after that. I don’t want you to end up with any long term injuries.”
Although Cloud knew that Zack’s words made sense, he just could not stop the panic rising.
His body suddenly began to tremble, unable to keep the physical signs of distress at bay.
“Cloud?” Zack asked softly, concerned about the sudden tremors.
Cloud just shook his head.
“I don’t want to go.” He choked out, and then ran from Zack’s slackened grip, completely startling the dark haired man.
“Hey! Cloud! Cloud, come back here!” Zack yelled after him, taking off in pursuit of the blond cadet.
However, Cloud had rounded a corner way before Zack did, and when the SOLDIER turned it, he could not see Cloud anywhere, merely the empty staircase that led to all the floors below.
Zack was just about to continue the chase after the boy, when he stopped, his reason finally kicking in.
It was useless to continue now; Cloud had a head start on him anyway, and now he knew that then blond could be anywhere right now, so it would be practically impossible to find him now.
Right now, he could do something that was productive, instead of partaking in a wild goose chase.
“Seph? Aren’t you going to say anything?”
It was safe to say that Zack Fair was now uneasy.
He had decided to go to report back to Sephiroth on his newfound ‘evidence’ and the man had not said a word since Zack’s account of events had stopped.
His eyes had darkened during the tale.
“General?”
This seemed to snap the commander of the army out of whatever dark musings had been occupying him, and he turned to Zack and said with so much force that you would be a fool not to believe him, he said, “This will not be ignored.” The silver haired man said quietly, in a deadly calm voice.
His eyes burned.
“Who is the perpetrator?” He asked, still too calmly and quietly, narrowing his eyes.
“I don’t know, Seph.” Zack admitted quietly, his shoulders slumping slightly when the general whipped around and fixed Zack with a judging stare.
“You don’t know? Zack, how can you not know? I thought you said that the…act,” Sephiroth wrinkled his nose in disgust, “was taking place when you got there.”
Zack shifted on his feet, looking truly miserable, because he himself didn’t quite know how the guy had managed to escape without being seen by him.
“Well, it was.” The other SOLDIER admitted, his tone one of slight helplessness.
“I don’t quite know what to tell you, because I don’t know what happened. They were obviously just…finishing,” Zack grimaced, and Sephiroth blanched, “when I got there, so I couldn’t exactly stay there because he was just going out. And I didn’t go in straight away because at first I wasn’t completely sure what was going on. I had just gone to get some…evidence. And boy, did I get it.” Zack laughed bitterly and without humour.
“And when it did finally sink in, I just…froze. I couldn’t move. Until that bastard started to get up, and then I had to jump into some other cadet’s room to hide; I wanted to get a look at this guy without him seeing me. But that plan backfired; in the few bloody seconds it took for me to come out of my hiding place, the git had already gone. And I thought about following, but I couldn’t leave Cloud there on his own…like that.”
Sephiroth nodded wearily, holding up a hand as if to say, enough, I don’t want to hear of any more wrongdoings; I hear of too many.
“What did the doctors have to say?” The General asked, rubbing his hands over his face as if to rid himself of his tiredness.
Zack swallowed and shuffled on his feet for the second time that day, as he thought of Cloud running from him and wondered if just letting him go was a good idea.
“They haven’t said anything; he hasn’t gone to see them yet.”
Sephiroth turned to face Zack, his eyes blazing.
“Why not? I thought you would have taken him straight to the infirmary.” There was no judgement in Sephiroth’s voice, just curiosity mixed with anger. The rage was not focused on Zack, but the perpetrator of the crime.
Zack sighed and rubbed a hand over his face.
“Yeah, I tried to, but he freaked out on me and ran off. I swear, that kid can run faster than any SOLDIER I’ve ever met; we were only a few feet away from the stairs, and I was following pretty much straight away, but when I rounded the corner, I couldn’t find him anywhere. I thought about going after him, but I thought it’d be more productive if I came and told you. That way, it gives me time to think things over while he has a moment to calm himself down.”
Although Zack was pretty sure of his plan, as was always the case when he saw Sephiroth’s calm and neutral face as he weighed the situation, he began to doubt himself.
“Or do you think I should have gone after him? Should I go now? If you think he might run off somewhere, if I start now, I’ll have a better chance of finding him.” The SOLDIER babbled, his face creasing with worry as he tormented himself with thoughts of what Cloud could have done.
Sephiroth simply shook his head, waving off his friend’s concerns, telling him without words to calm down.
“No. He won’t have run away. At least he won’t have run far; he will not have left the Shinra building.” Sephiroth said with absolute confidence.
Zack gave the General a questioning look, wondering how he could be so certain about this.
Sephiroth chuckled slightly, though it held little humour.
“It is human nature to seek security after a distressing occurrence. Human nature also dictates that ‘security’ means something that we are familiar with; because if we are familiar with it, we have learnt whether it is safe or not. Strife has no friends or relatives living outside of Shinra, save for his mother, and she is too far away. His only friend,” here Sephiroth nodded at Zack, “resides in the Shinra building, and he knows the people, the layout and the routine and activities of the Shinra building. He is familiar with it. It is his only security away from Nibelheim, which is too far away to help.”
Zack nodded, as he could see the logic of it when it was said like that.
But then his brow furrowed into a frown again, and he looked back at Sephiroth with worried eyes.
“Well it’s a good thing he’s still here, obviously, but still…do you think I should go look for him now?” The brunette asked, concern and doubt wavering in his eyes.
Sephiroth was silent for a while, and he eyed Zack carefully as he debated. And when he spoke, it was slow and deliberate.
“I think…I think you should give him time to calm down and sleep. And I also think that it is essential that you contact him first thing in the morning. You should be in his dorm room before he wakes up.” Sephiroth almost glared at Zack, as if to impress upon him how important it was that he follow these instructions.
The SOLDIER looked at Sephiroth curiously.
“Well, I was planning to go to him in the morning anyway, but…why is it so important that I get to him before he wakes up?”
Sephiroth smiled grimly.
“Do you remember some of the…shall we say, more challenging, moments of Wutai, Zack?” The General asked, his eyes stormy.
Zack shuddered.
“Of course I remember, where’s this going?” He almost snapped, then proceeded to look sheepish at his snippy tone.
Sephiroth didn’t seem to care. Either that or he didn’t notice.
“Well then, you will remember that after some of the worst times, for example, after a particularly bad battle, one would not be horrified, as anyone else would imagine you would be after an experience like that; one would not feel horror or sickness, one would feel simply… nothing. You would go about your activities with a sort of numbness for the rest of that day. But for the rest of that day only. The next day was when the horror hit. That’s when the younger or simply overstressed SOLDIERS and troopers would start screaming. Because you have had a whole night for the adrenaline and shock to wear off. And you have dreamt. So it’s the ‘morning after’, if you will excuse the innuendo, which is the clincher.”
Zack closed his eyes and sighed as realisation struck. He shook his head.
“Of course. You’re right. I’ll go down to his room at 6:00. He usually wakes up half an hour later.”
Sephiroth nodded.
“But for now, get some sleep. You’ll need it if you’re going to put all your negotiating skills to use tomorrow.”
Zack groaned as he was startled into consciousness by the awful chatter of his radio alarm.
His arm flailed as he felt about for the switch to turn off the sound.
“Don’t mean to sound callous, but right now I don’t care about rising house prices.” Zack mumbled to the radio presenter, who fell silent when Zack finally found the right button.
For a few moments he just lay there, trying to properly wake up and get over the shock of being woken at half past five in the morning.
He had wanted to be sure that he got to Cloud before he woke up and had a chance to panic.
At the thought of the young blond, Zack groaned and pulled himself out of bed, grasping for any clothes that were close by.
Things had been going quite well, as he had found a t-shirt and socks, but then it suddenly went downhill.
“I could have sworn that I didn’t own a leather harness.”
Zack was still trying to shake the last of the sleep out of his eyes by the time he reached Cloud’s room, knocking on the door softly.
“Cloud?” He called softly.
There was no reply from inside. Zack knocked on the door, louder this time, feeling panic already starting to rise.
“Cloud?!”
“What the fuck - oh, it’s you Zack.”
The door had swung open to reveal another First Class SOLDIER that Zack was friendly with.
Zack stared, unable to digest this information, utterly confused.
What the hell was Thompson doing in Cloud’s…oh HELL no.
No. It couldn’t be. Not Thompson. He wouldn’t do something like that.
Then again, you never could tell…but no! No. Thompson was Zack’s friend. Zack knew how to read people…didn’t he?
Alright, alright, just calm down, I’m sure there’s a perfectly…ahh, fuck it, I’m going to KILL him! I’m going to - no! No. Stop it. Can’t just ramble on and make accusations like that without any proof whatsoever. Think of what Seph said.
Zack’s thoughts whirled around at a hundred miles a minute, and Thompson was starting to give him a strange look.
So Zack schooled his face into a pleasant smile, and took a deep breath.
“Hey Thompson, sorry to wake you…what are you doing in Strife’s room?”
For a moment, the other SOLDIER looked perplexed, and then his face lit up in comprehension.
“Strife? Oh, you mean the kid that rooms here? He’ll be at the barracks, we just came back from a mission, and we were given room privileges.”
Thompson opened the door a little wider, for Zack to see that Cloud was no where in the room.
Understanding hit Zack, and a sigh of relief left him. Thompson was not Cloud’s little ‘singer’.
Shinra military had a system called ‘Room Privileges’, for SOLDIER’s, that was perhaps, slightly unfair.
Room Privileges stated that if any SOLDIER’s came back from a violent, long and/or exhausting mission any later than one a.m., they could use the Cadet’s rooms to sleep and recover in, as SOLDIER dorms were a long way away from the main entrance to Shinra.
The idea had originally been that as a result of this, the SOLDIER’s would be rested enough to go back on duty the next day. That idea had been discarded after the first three uses of RP.
The Cadet’s would spend the night in the empty barracks that they had used in previous years.
Great, so Cloud was in the barracks. With all the other Cadet’s and his tormentors surrounding him. Way to make the kid feel comfortable.
Zack was just about to say his goodbye’s and shut the door, when he suddenly realised who he was talking to.
“Hey Thompson, you’re a medic, right?” Zack asked, still amazed at himself for not remembering sooner.
“Yeah.” The other replied, leaning against the door frame.
“Well, do you think you could do me a favour?” Zack requested, his mind working at twice its normal speed in order to consider how Cloud might react to Thompson.
“Yeah, sure.” The other replied. “I owe you big time anyway, for getting me that week of leave”
Zack smiled slightly, but it was preoccupied. They had to get to Cloud before he woke up. He needed to explain this quickly.
“Great, thanks for this, I’ll owe you one now. I want you to examine someone. A cadet…and I want you to keep it off the record. He doesn’t want to go to the medical centre; he’s kind of freaked out right now, and I figured that rather than forcing him to go down there, it’d be better if I had someone I trust take a look at him.” Zack explained hurriedly, looking at Thompson carefully, awaiting his reaction.
“Sure. I’ll take a look at him, and no one else needs to know.” Thompson agreed, somewhat darkly. He had to patch up too many cadets off the record. It was sad, and said a hell of a lot about the other cadets. “So I’m guessing you need me now, right?”
Zack smiled in relief, and replied with an affirmative.
“Lead the way.” Thompson said.
Zack and Thompson strolled into the barracks to find it, predictably, full of the other cadets that had been chucked out of their rooms.
Zack grinned slightly as he considered how he was going to get rid of the others. Simple; play the role of the hard ass First Class SOLDIER. The type that would make the toughest drill sergeants proud.
“ALL RIGHT, YOU LITTLE S.O.B’S, MOVE IT OUT OF HERE!” Zack bellowed as loud as his voice could go. All the cadets jumped out of their skins and looked around dazedly for a moment, wondering what the hell was happening.
“I SAID MOVE YOUR SCRAWNY ASSES! NOW!” Now that the cadets were aware of what was happening, they were all scrambling out of bed and hastening to obey.
“TOO SLOW, LADIES, TOO SLOW! ALRIGHT COME ON, THAT’S IT, MOVE IT OUT OF HERE! GO DOWN AND GET AN EARLY BREAKFAST OR FIND ONE OF YOUR BUDDIES TO ROOM WITH, WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU WANT, JUST MOVE IT!”
The cadets began filing out of the room, hastily and still somewhat dazedly grabbing whatever essentials were close to them; clothes, deodorant, soap…
And they were all muttering darkly as they cleared out, but even so they obeyed, and still had their respect and admiration for Zack; even though he had just interrupted their sleep, they found a way to admire even this. They admired the way that Zack could make his voice carry, and the way that when he spoke, everyone obeyed. Though they were a little surprised; Zack was generally thought of as one of the ‘nice’ SOLDIER’s. The one that you went to because he didn’t shout and scream like the drill sergeants.
Zack was pretty much the type of SOLDIER every recruit and cadet wanted to be.
If you removed Sephiroth from their line of sight.
Thompson chuckled slightly as all the cadets immediately left.
All apart from one lump that was still curled up in bed.
He nodded in the direction of the lump, and looked at Zack questioningly. The other SOLDIER nodded. He motioned for Thompson to be quiet as he quietly made his way to the cadet’s bed.
Cloud had recognised Zack’s voice, and had simply stayed in bed in a vain attempt to hide from the confrontation that was coming.
So now he simply ignored Zack, even when he felt the SOLDIER’s weight dip the bed.
“Cloud?” Came the soft voice. Cloud simply curled up tighter.
Zack gripped the edge of the duvet cover, and pulled gently, just enough to show Cloud’s face.
Zack leaned down to peer into those blue eyes with gentle demanding.
“Cloud,” Zack began softly, “I’m going to give you a choice. We can do this the easy way (i.e. my way), and you can let my buddy, who is a medic, look you over, here, in the comfort of your own bed, or we could do this the hard way, and we could drag you down to the medical centre, where you will have to submit to an examination anyway. And see if you can guess which way is gonna cause you more stress.”
Cloud sniffled, and sent a watery glare Zack’s way.
“I hate you.”
“No you don’t.” Zack said gently, pulling the boy carefully into a sitting position, and motioning for Thompson to approach.
The medic sat down on the bed, setting down his bag of supplies, and tugging on white medical gloves.
“Hey Cloud. My name’s Thompson. I’ve been a medic since I came here as a cadet, when I started out on an intern programme, so you don’t need to worry, I’ll take good care of you.” Thompson assured, rummaging through his bag.
Cloud simply nodded, his entire body tense in Zack’s arms, as if trying to send Zack vibes of ‘Let go of me. I don’t want to be here. Make him leave. If you let go of me for one second I will bolt. Please just let go.’
Zack was getting the vibes loud and clear, but he paid them no heed, other than stroking Cloud’s shoulder with his thumb.
Thompson looked at the still tightly strung Cloud, and sighed a little.
“Don’t worry Cloud. This is strictly confidential. It stays between us. Nobody else is going to know about this.” He reassured, noticing that this seemed to relax the boy a tiny amount.
“Okay, look, first thing’s first, I need to get a look at those ribs; they look like they’ve been crushed a bit. Are you finding it a bit difficult to draw deep breaths?” Thompson asked, suddenly all business.
Cloud shrank away slightly, as far as Zack would allow, but nodded in response to the question. He had found that since last night he had to take rather shallow breaths.
Thompson drew a stethoscope out of his bag, and gestured for Cloud to lean forward.
“Okay then, in that case I need to get a listen to your respiration.” Thompson muttered, half to himself and half to Zack and Cloud.
“Just lean forwards for me please.”
Zack gently pushed Cloud forwards and lifted his shirt for the medic, exposing Cloud’s carpet burn and scalding inflicted back.
Both SOLDIER’s grimaced at the raw flesh, and Thompson murmured,
“We’ll have to deal with that soon. For now, I’m afraid that this is going to sting a little.”
Cloud gasped and flinched away as cold metal touched hot, raw skin. He tried again to struggle out of Zack’s arms and away from the probing medic, but his friend simply shushed him, and tightened his grip, his thumb still keeping up a soothing, metronome stroking of Cloud’s arm.
“I’m just going to put my hand over your ribs; I need to see how far they can move.” Thompson explained, reaching around to gently squeeze Cloud’s ribs.
“Take a breath for me Cloud, as deep as you can. It’s gonna hurt, and I’m sorry, but it won’t take long.”
Cloud looked at Zack as if to implore him to stop this, but Zack just nodded his head, prompting him to breathe.
The blond scowled, but took as deep a breath as he could manage without it hurting. It was a shallow breath, even Cloud would admit that, but he just knew that if he drew in the tentative breath any more, he would be in pain.
“Come on Cloud, I need it to be deeper than that.” Thompson reprimanded gently.
Cloud’s eyes swivelled in shock. He let out his breath.
“If I breathe any deeper, it hurts.” He protested, trying to wiggle free of the grasp of the older men again.
Zack simply exerted a little more pressure, readjusting his hold on Cloud.
“I know it’s gonna be uncomfortable, but I need you to do this to see how badly your ribs are damaged.” Thompson explained calmly.
Cloud did nothing. He did not want to aggravate the injury…the pain from breathing too deeply had kept him awake for quite a while during the night.
“Come on Cloud.” Came Zack’s soft voice from the side. He petted Cloud’s hair. “If you just take one deep breath, Thompson can stop your ribs from hurting so badly.”
Cloud still had a very strong desire to simply run, but he knew that Zack was right; he just wanted the pain to abate.
He drew in a deep breath.
And felt a very sharp pain.
He immediately winced and wriggled a little, as if he could somehow shift his ribs to a more comfortable position.
He felt Thompson squeezing his ribs delicately, and heard Zack’s voice to his right tell him that he was a good Choco.
Choco; the nickname Zack had graced him with within one hour of meeting him. It usually pissed off Cloud. Now he just found it strangely comforting.
“That’s it Cloud, I just need you to try a little deeper.” Came Thompson’s voice.
Cloud whimpered. This hurt as it was, he couldn’t go any further.
Zack stroked Cloud’s now slightly sweat damp hair, feeling very sympathetic.
“You can do it Cloud, just a little more.” Zack encouraged, in a voice that was kind, but left no room for argument.
Cloud sucked in a little more breath and screwed his eyes tight at the pain.
Thompson again felt his ribs gently.
Cloud feared he would ask for a deeper breath still, but was relieved when he only said,
“Okay, that’s fine Cloud. You can breathe out now, but just do it slowly okay?”
Cloud had to employ his strongest self restraint to do as Thompson said and not just let out the air in one big gust.
Zack patted the blonde’s back, and then looked to Thompson, wordlessly asking for his findings.
“The ribs are quite severely bruised, but nothing is broken; but I’ll have to put a brace on them to keep them from moving too much; if they are subjected to any more stress they might crack.” The medic explained, rummaging around in his kit.
“But before I do that I’ll need to do something about his back and look over the rest of the more superficial wounds.”
Zack nodded, hoping that he could get Cloud to stay still for all this. He looked across to the boy, who was drawn up, with a look of pain and weariness and slight indignation at being poked and prodded. Definitely jumpy.
A healing materia would be quicker and easier. Zack thought wistfully. But I know that that’s pretty much out of the question, seeing as the bloody Shinra restricts use of materia to battle and field op only; any injuries at HQ have to do without the shinies. Stingy bastards.
Mind you, I can see their point; materia is like a lifeline in battle, and I know from painful first hand experience how…inconvenient a shortage can be.
Zack shuddered, remembering the times that he had cursed whoever was using materia when he needed it.
Besides, he thought again, there is only so much materia can do for something like this.
“Uh, Zack?”
Zack was pulled out of his musings by Thompson’s voice. It held a note of trepidation.
He looked around to see what the matter was, only to find Cloud curled up even tighter than before, his body thrumming with tension, everything about him exuding a message of, ‘Don’t touch me. If you touch me, I may just have to hurt you. You’ve done enough touching. Now go away.’
Zack licked his lip slightly nervously. He wasn’t quite sure how to go about this. Gentle handling was in order.
“Cloud?” He called softly. Cloud’s head snapped up unnaturally fast. He looked at Zack with wide, almost suspicious eyes.
“Aww, come on kiddo, don’t give me that look. I’m not here to hurt you, and neither is Thompson.” Zack pouted, hoping to lighten Cloud’s mood a little, and make him less tense.
It worked, partially, as Cloud’s muscles visibly relaxed a little, now that he was faced with the familiar sight of Zack joking around. But he refused to uncurl from his protective ball.
Thompson decided to speak up, now that Zack had soothed the boy down a little.
“Look Cloud, all I have to do is sort out that friction burn and scalding, and then clean the other, more minor wounds, then I’ll be able to put a brace on those ribs, and I’ll be done.” He coaxed, appealing to Cloud’s desire to get this over with, and put it behind him.
“All I’m gonna do is clean the burn, put some cream on it, and cover the worst area. That’s all.”
This seemed to appease Cloud, who eyed the medic warily for a while, and then nodded briefly.
Thompson then reached into his bag, bringing out a bottle of clear fluid and a white cloth. He overturned the bottle onto the piece of cloth, soaking it. He then turned to face the two other men.
“This is going to sting a little.” Thompson warned, more for the benefit of Zack, who heeded the warning by gripping Cloud’s arms in a comforting but confining hug.
Thompson then gently touched the sterilizer to Cloud’s raw flesh, and carefully wiped and dabbed at the skin of the cadet’s back.
Cloud’s eyes widened in shock for a moment, then he hissed viciously, wriggling wildly in Zack’s arms.
“Ow! That hurts! Let me go you bastard!” Cloud snarled, the pain momentarily blocking out anything but the desire to get away.
His hand shot out from Zack’s grip, and immediately went back to strike and claw desperately at Thompson, his snarls growing louder.
Zack caught the hand in mid swing, before it got to the medic, and tucked it back under his own arm, patting Cloud soothingly.
“Don’t hit him, Cloud, it’s not Thompson’s fault you’re hurting.” Zack said in the gentlest reprimand he could manage, while thinking that, actually, it was partially due to Thompson’s treatment that he was hurting.
But he wasn’t going to say this to Cloud.
Cloud continued to hiss and spit his discomfort in the SOLDIER’s hold, until they were finally done. Cloud’s cuts and bruises had been cleaned and bandaged, and he had a tight, material wrap going around his ribs to steady them.
When Thompson and Zack finally released him, Cloud scooted back to the end of his bed, curling in on himself, gently pawing at his injuries, and glaring out at the two of them. It reminded Zack somewhat of a cat licking its wounds.
Thompson stood up, and Zack followed him to the other side of the room, out of Cloud’s hearing range.
“His ribs aren’t broken, though they are severely bruised, and could end up breaking if they are put under any more strain for the time being. The brace should stop them from moving.” Thompson reported, Zack listening intently, arms folded, brow creased.
“The friction burn and scalding on his back is nasty; you’ll have to apply the sterilizer and cream every day, and re-do his bandages. The same goes for the cuts and bruises; you’ll need to clean them, and re-cover them. Let them get some air at night, but then cover them again in the morning.” Here Thompson ground to a halt, and looked from Zack, then back over to Cloud awkwardly.
Zack arched a questioning eyebrow.
“What? What is it?” He asked, a little anxious that Thompson was not telling him something.
Thompson shifted uneasily on his feet.
“Well…um, Zack…” He faltered, trying to find the words. The look on Zack’s face seemed to prompt them to come.
“Look, from what you said, and the way you’ve handled this, I’m guessing that someone…did more than just beat him up.” He looked over at Cloud, wincing at how nasty even the polite way sounded.
Zack closed his eyes and sighed. After a while he simply nodded shortly.
“Well…I think you know that it would be best if I…examined the…trauma site.” Thompson said delicately, not really used to dealing with anxious family and friends; his expertise was in the pure field medicine. His job was to patch people up either in the heat of battle, straight after the fight, or treat their long lasting injuries from war. It was someone else’s job to comfort worried friends and relatives.
Zack’s face screwed up. He could not imagine having to go through the discomfort and the indignity. And he wasn’t sure Cloud would go through with it.
“Aww man, he is not gonna like this.” Zack cursed, rubbing his hand through his hair.
He turned to Thompson.
“Look, I know where you are coming from, and I agree with you, but I’m not sure that Cloud will. I don’t know if he’ll agree to this.”
Thompson sighed.
“Well, I can understand why he wouldn’t want to do this, but it would be better in the long run. But understand I can’t perform the exam without his consent.” The medic explained. “Look, go over there, explain to him what’s gonna happen, and why it needs to be done, and see what he says. But we can’t force him.”
Zack nodded slowly and took a deep breath to brace himself, then walked back over to Cloud.
The blond was still curled up and sniffling occasionally, obviously very upset at the examination that had, in his view, been no better than an undignified and rather painful mauling. Zack sat down slowly, reaching out a hand to smooth down Cloud’s hair.
Cloud started at the touch, but quieted when he saw that it was only Zack, and he leaned into the older man’s touch.
Zack smiled, and carefully brought the blond to lean into his side, not sure whether Cloud would accept this.
As it was, the boy was pliant in Zack’s arms, and gladly rested against him, nuzzling Zack’s neck slightly.
The SOLDIER took a few moments to just let Cloud lean in silence, giving him a chance to calm down before he started his persuasion.
“Cloud?” he murmured when he felt the younger man’s pulse calm down.
“Mm?” came the sleepy murmur, and Zack looked down and saw that Cloud’s eyes were closed against his chest.
“Cloud…I think it would be a good idea if you let Thompson get a look at…the last injury.” Zack hesitated, not sure how to word it, and feeling very cautious.
Zack had been expecting an explosion of outrage and fear from Cloud. Had expected screaming and tears and struggling.
But none of those things came. Cloud was still against his friend’s chest, and he was perfectly silent.
Until he whispered something so quiet that Zack would not have heard, were it not for his Mako enhancements.
“Please Zack. No more. No more. Just let me go to sleep. It’s not hurting anymore. Just please. Let me sleep.”
It was not a scream. It was not a tantrum. It was not even really that forceful. It was just weary and pleading. And Zack found that it was also impossible to disagree with.
“Alright. Alright, Cloud. You don’t have to do anything else. You can sleep now.”
TBC
Rating: R for adult themes and swearing but nothing too graphic yet. Rating may change.
Warnings: Angst, mentions of violence, swearing, adult themes. Zack.
Summary: Zack has noticed a change in Cloud, but the blond won't say a word.
Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Final Fantasy 7, nor am I making any profit from this.
Part Four
Walking down the practically empty halls of Shinra, Cloud made as if to turn left, but frowned when he saw that Zack had stopped and seemingly had no intention of following.
“Zack, your room’s this way.” Cloud said weakly, nodding his head to the left, sounding so weary, as if he was praying that Zack had just forgotten, and was not planning to take him somewhere else.
The blonde’s tone almost made Zack give in out of sympathy, but then his sense came back to him, and he realised that, while Cloud may not like what he was about to do, it would help the boy in the long run.
“We’re not going to my room, Spiky.” The SOLDIER replied softly, taking a few small steps closer to Cloud. “We’re going to the medical centre.”
Cloud’s eyes immediately widened, and he backed up until he hit the wall, staring at Zack with a mixture of emotions on his face. The primary emotion was fear, Zack could tell, but he could also see anger, shock and suspicion in there as well.
“No way!” Cloud yelled, again hugging himself with his arms. “There’s no way that I’m going there. I don’t want to. I don’t want some doctor pawing me and prodding me. I don’t want to be touched by them! There is no way that I’m going to let them…look at me.”
“Cloud, you need to calm down.” Zack told him in a low tone, taking another step closer to Cloud and taking his arm gently.
The boy flinched, looking at Zack with wary eyes, looking as though he would bolt at any second.
Zack rubbed the boy’s arm soothingly, then brought his other hand up behind the other’s head, gently guiding Cloud to look at him.
“Cloud, please, they aren’t going to hurt you, the doctor’s job is to help you. They won’t do you any harm.” Zack reasoned, his tone still soft and calm, his hand still stroking, in hopes that the methods used to calm chocobo’s also worked on humans.
Cloud simply shook his head, and folded his arms more tightly around himself in a death grip. His eyes shone with a feral look, and Zack actually felt a little uneasy.
“Cloud, be reasonable.” Zack begged softly. “I at least want you to get someone to look at those burns; you scalded yourself in that shower. Please, that’s all I want for now, and then we can deal with…other matters after that. I don’t want you to end up with any long term injuries.”
Although Cloud knew that Zack’s words made sense, he just could not stop the panic rising.
His body suddenly began to tremble, unable to keep the physical signs of distress at bay.
“Cloud?” Zack asked softly, concerned about the sudden tremors.
Cloud just shook his head.
“I don’t want to go.” He choked out, and then ran from Zack’s slackened grip, completely startling the dark haired man.
“Hey! Cloud! Cloud, come back here!” Zack yelled after him, taking off in pursuit of the blond cadet.
However, Cloud had rounded a corner way before Zack did, and when the SOLDIER turned it, he could not see Cloud anywhere, merely the empty staircase that led to all the floors below.
Zack was just about to continue the chase after the boy, when he stopped, his reason finally kicking in.
It was useless to continue now; Cloud had a head start on him anyway, and now he knew that then blond could be anywhere right now, so it would be practically impossible to find him now.
Right now, he could do something that was productive, instead of partaking in a wild goose chase.
“Seph? Aren’t you going to say anything?”
It was safe to say that Zack Fair was now uneasy.
He had decided to go to report back to Sephiroth on his newfound ‘evidence’ and the man had not said a word since Zack’s account of events had stopped.
His eyes had darkened during the tale.
“General?”
This seemed to snap the commander of the army out of whatever dark musings had been occupying him, and he turned to Zack and said with so much force that you would be a fool not to believe him, he said, “This will not be ignored.” The silver haired man said quietly, in a deadly calm voice.
His eyes burned.
“Who is the perpetrator?” He asked, still too calmly and quietly, narrowing his eyes.
“I don’t know, Seph.” Zack admitted quietly, his shoulders slumping slightly when the general whipped around and fixed Zack with a judging stare.
“You don’t know? Zack, how can you not know? I thought you said that the…act,” Sephiroth wrinkled his nose in disgust, “was taking place when you got there.”
Zack shifted on his feet, looking truly miserable, because he himself didn’t quite know how the guy had managed to escape without being seen by him.
“Well, it was.” The other SOLDIER admitted, his tone one of slight helplessness.
“I don’t quite know what to tell you, because I don’t know what happened. They were obviously just…finishing,” Zack grimaced, and Sephiroth blanched, “when I got there, so I couldn’t exactly stay there because he was just going out. And I didn’t go in straight away because at first I wasn’t completely sure what was going on. I had just gone to get some…evidence. And boy, did I get it.” Zack laughed bitterly and without humour.
“And when it did finally sink in, I just…froze. I couldn’t move. Until that bastard started to get up, and then I had to jump into some other cadet’s room to hide; I wanted to get a look at this guy without him seeing me. But that plan backfired; in the few bloody seconds it took for me to come out of my hiding place, the git had already gone. And I thought about following, but I couldn’t leave Cloud there on his own…like that.”
Sephiroth nodded wearily, holding up a hand as if to say, enough, I don’t want to hear of any more wrongdoings; I hear of too many.
“What did the doctors have to say?” The General asked, rubbing his hands over his face as if to rid himself of his tiredness.
Zack swallowed and shuffled on his feet for the second time that day, as he thought of Cloud running from him and wondered if just letting him go was a good idea.
“They haven’t said anything; he hasn’t gone to see them yet.”
Sephiroth turned to face Zack, his eyes blazing.
“Why not? I thought you would have taken him straight to the infirmary.” There was no judgement in Sephiroth’s voice, just curiosity mixed with anger. The rage was not focused on Zack, but the perpetrator of the crime.
Zack sighed and rubbed a hand over his face.
“Yeah, I tried to, but he freaked out on me and ran off. I swear, that kid can run faster than any SOLDIER I’ve ever met; we were only a few feet away from the stairs, and I was following pretty much straight away, but when I rounded the corner, I couldn’t find him anywhere. I thought about going after him, but I thought it’d be more productive if I came and told you. That way, it gives me time to think things over while he has a moment to calm himself down.”
Although Zack was pretty sure of his plan, as was always the case when he saw Sephiroth’s calm and neutral face as he weighed the situation, he began to doubt himself.
“Or do you think I should have gone after him? Should I go now? If you think he might run off somewhere, if I start now, I’ll have a better chance of finding him.” The SOLDIER babbled, his face creasing with worry as he tormented himself with thoughts of what Cloud could have done.
Sephiroth simply shook his head, waving off his friend’s concerns, telling him without words to calm down.
“No. He won’t have run away. At least he won’t have run far; he will not have left the Shinra building.” Sephiroth said with absolute confidence.
Zack gave the General a questioning look, wondering how he could be so certain about this.
Sephiroth chuckled slightly, though it held little humour.
“It is human nature to seek security after a distressing occurrence. Human nature also dictates that ‘security’ means something that we are familiar with; because if we are familiar with it, we have learnt whether it is safe or not. Strife has no friends or relatives living outside of Shinra, save for his mother, and she is too far away. His only friend,” here Sephiroth nodded at Zack, “resides in the Shinra building, and he knows the people, the layout and the routine and activities of the Shinra building. He is familiar with it. It is his only security away from Nibelheim, which is too far away to help.”
Zack nodded, as he could see the logic of it when it was said like that.
But then his brow furrowed into a frown again, and he looked back at Sephiroth with worried eyes.
“Well it’s a good thing he’s still here, obviously, but still…do you think I should go look for him now?” The brunette asked, concern and doubt wavering in his eyes.
Sephiroth was silent for a while, and he eyed Zack carefully as he debated. And when he spoke, it was slow and deliberate.
“I think…I think you should give him time to calm down and sleep. And I also think that it is essential that you contact him first thing in the morning. You should be in his dorm room before he wakes up.” Sephiroth almost glared at Zack, as if to impress upon him how important it was that he follow these instructions.
The SOLDIER looked at Sephiroth curiously.
“Well, I was planning to go to him in the morning anyway, but…why is it so important that I get to him before he wakes up?”
Sephiroth smiled grimly.
“Do you remember some of the…shall we say, more challenging, moments of Wutai, Zack?” The General asked, his eyes stormy.
Zack shuddered.
“Of course I remember, where’s this going?” He almost snapped, then proceeded to look sheepish at his snippy tone.
Sephiroth didn’t seem to care. Either that or he didn’t notice.
“Well then, you will remember that after some of the worst times, for example, after a particularly bad battle, one would not be horrified, as anyone else would imagine you would be after an experience like that; one would not feel horror or sickness, one would feel simply… nothing. You would go about your activities with a sort of numbness for the rest of that day. But for the rest of that day only. The next day was when the horror hit. That’s when the younger or simply overstressed SOLDIERS and troopers would start screaming. Because you have had a whole night for the adrenaline and shock to wear off. And you have dreamt. So it’s the ‘morning after’, if you will excuse the innuendo, which is the clincher.”
Zack closed his eyes and sighed as realisation struck. He shook his head.
“Of course. You’re right. I’ll go down to his room at 6:00. He usually wakes up half an hour later.”
Sephiroth nodded.
“But for now, get some sleep. You’ll need it if you’re going to put all your negotiating skills to use tomorrow.”
Zack groaned as he was startled into consciousness by the awful chatter of his radio alarm.
His arm flailed as he felt about for the switch to turn off the sound.
“Don’t mean to sound callous, but right now I don’t care about rising house prices.” Zack mumbled to the radio presenter, who fell silent when Zack finally found the right button.
For a few moments he just lay there, trying to properly wake up and get over the shock of being woken at half past five in the morning.
He had wanted to be sure that he got to Cloud before he woke up and had a chance to panic.
At the thought of the young blond, Zack groaned and pulled himself out of bed, grasping for any clothes that were close by.
Things had been going quite well, as he had found a t-shirt and socks, but then it suddenly went downhill.
“I could have sworn that I didn’t own a leather harness.”
Zack was still trying to shake the last of the sleep out of his eyes by the time he reached Cloud’s room, knocking on the door softly.
“Cloud?” He called softly.
There was no reply from inside. Zack knocked on the door, louder this time, feeling panic already starting to rise.
“Cloud?!”
“What the fuck - oh, it’s you Zack.”
The door had swung open to reveal another First Class SOLDIER that Zack was friendly with.
Zack stared, unable to digest this information, utterly confused.
What the hell was Thompson doing in Cloud’s…oh HELL no.
No. It couldn’t be. Not Thompson. He wouldn’t do something like that.
Then again, you never could tell…but no! No. Thompson was Zack’s friend. Zack knew how to read people…didn’t he?
Alright, alright, just calm down, I’m sure there’s a perfectly…ahh, fuck it, I’m going to KILL him! I’m going to - no! No. Stop it. Can’t just ramble on and make accusations like that without any proof whatsoever. Think of what Seph said.
Zack’s thoughts whirled around at a hundred miles a minute, and Thompson was starting to give him a strange look.
So Zack schooled his face into a pleasant smile, and took a deep breath.
“Hey Thompson, sorry to wake you…what are you doing in Strife’s room?”
For a moment, the other SOLDIER looked perplexed, and then his face lit up in comprehension.
“Strife? Oh, you mean the kid that rooms here? He’ll be at the barracks, we just came back from a mission, and we were given room privileges.”
Thompson opened the door a little wider, for Zack to see that Cloud was no where in the room.
Understanding hit Zack, and a sigh of relief left him. Thompson was not Cloud’s little ‘singer’.
Shinra military had a system called ‘Room Privileges’, for SOLDIER’s, that was perhaps, slightly unfair.
Room Privileges stated that if any SOLDIER’s came back from a violent, long and/or exhausting mission any later than one a.m., they could use the Cadet’s rooms to sleep and recover in, as SOLDIER dorms were a long way away from the main entrance to Shinra.
The idea had originally been that as a result of this, the SOLDIER’s would be rested enough to go back on duty the next day. That idea had been discarded after the first three uses of RP.
The Cadet’s would spend the night in the empty barracks that they had used in previous years.
Great, so Cloud was in the barracks. With all the other Cadet’s and his tormentors surrounding him. Way to make the kid feel comfortable.
Zack was just about to say his goodbye’s and shut the door, when he suddenly realised who he was talking to.
“Hey Thompson, you’re a medic, right?” Zack asked, still amazed at himself for not remembering sooner.
“Yeah.” The other replied, leaning against the door frame.
“Well, do you think you could do me a favour?” Zack requested, his mind working at twice its normal speed in order to consider how Cloud might react to Thompson.
“Yeah, sure.” The other replied. “I owe you big time anyway, for getting me that week of leave”
Zack smiled slightly, but it was preoccupied. They had to get to Cloud before he woke up. He needed to explain this quickly.
“Great, thanks for this, I’ll owe you one now. I want you to examine someone. A cadet…and I want you to keep it off the record. He doesn’t want to go to the medical centre; he’s kind of freaked out right now, and I figured that rather than forcing him to go down there, it’d be better if I had someone I trust take a look at him.” Zack explained hurriedly, looking at Thompson carefully, awaiting his reaction.
“Sure. I’ll take a look at him, and no one else needs to know.” Thompson agreed, somewhat darkly. He had to patch up too many cadets off the record. It was sad, and said a hell of a lot about the other cadets. “So I’m guessing you need me now, right?”
Zack smiled in relief, and replied with an affirmative.
“Lead the way.” Thompson said.
Zack and Thompson strolled into the barracks to find it, predictably, full of the other cadets that had been chucked out of their rooms.
Zack grinned slightly as he considered how he was going to get rid of the others. Simple; play the role of the hard ass First Class SOLDIER. The type that would make the toughest drill sergeants proud.
“ALL RIGHT, YOU LITTLE S.O.B’S, MOVE IT OUT OF HERE!” Zack bellowed as loud as his voice could go. All the cadets jumped out of their skins and looked around dazedly for a moment, wondering what the hell was happening.
“I SAID MOVE YOUR SCRAWNY ASSES! NOW!” Now that the cadets were aware of what was happening, they were all scrambling out of bed and hastening to obey.
“TOO SLOW, LADIES, TOO SLOW! ALRIGHT COME ON, THAT’S IT, MOVE IT OUT OF HERE! GO DOWN AND GET AN EARLY BREAKFAST OR FIND ONE OF YOUR BUDDIES TO ROOM WITH, WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU WANT, JUST MOVE IT!”
The cadets began filing out of the room, hastily and still somewhat dazedly grabbing whatever essentials were close to them; clothes, deodorant, soap…
And they were all muttering darkly as they cleared out, but even so they obeyed, and still had their respect and admiration for Zack; even though he had just interrupted their sleep, they found a way to admire even this. They admired the way that Zack could make his voice carry, and the way that when he spoke, everyone obeyed. Though they were a little surprised; Zack was generally thought of as one of the ‘nice’ SOLDIER’s. The one that you went to because he didn’t shout and scream like the drill sergeants.
Zack was pretty much the type of SOLDIER every recruit and cadet wanted to be.
If you removed Sephiroth from their line of sight.
Thompson chuckled slightly as all the cadets immediately left.
All apart from one lump that was still curled up in bed.
He nodded in the direction of the lump, and looked at Zack questioningly. The other SOLDIER nodded. He motioned for Thompson to be quiet as he quietly made his way to the cadet’s bed.
Cloud had recognised Zack’s voice, and had simply stayed in bed in a vain attempt to hide from the confrontation that was coming.
So now he simply ignored Zack, even when he felt the SOLDIER’s weight dip the bed.
“Cloud?” Came the soft voice. Cloud simply curled up tighter.
Zack gripped the edge of the duvet cover, and pulled gently, just enough to show Cloud’s face.
Zack leaned down to peer into those blue eyes with gentle demanding.
“Cloud,” Zack began softly, “I’m going to give you a choice. We can do this the easy way (i.e. my way), and you can let my buddy, who is a medic, look you over, here, in the comfort of your own bed, or we could do this the hard way, and we could drag you down to the medical centre, where you will have to submit to an examination anyway. And see if you can guess which way is gonna cause you more stress.”
Cloud sniffled, and sent a watery glare Zack’s way.
“I hate you.”
“No you don’t.” Zack said gently, pulling the boy carefully into a sitting position, and motioning for Thompson to approach.
The medic sat down on the bed, setting down his bag of supplies, and tugging on white medical gloves.
“Hey Cloud. My name’s Thompson. I’ve been a medic since I came here as a cadet, when I started out on an intern programme, so you don’t need to worry, I’ll take good care of you.” Thompson assured, rummaging through his bag.
Cloud simply nodded, his entire body tense in Zack’s arms, as if trying to send Zack vibes of ‘Let go of me. I don’t want to be here. Make him leave. If you let go of me for one second I will bolt. Please just let go.’
Zack was getting the vibes loud and clear, but he paid them no heed, other than stroking Cloud’s shoulder with his thumb.
Thompson looked at the still tightly strung Cloud, and sighed a little.
“Don’t worry Cloud. This is strictly confidential. It stays between us. Nobody else is going to know about this.” He reassured, noticing that this seemed to relax the boy a tiny amount.
“Okay, look, first thing’s first, I need to get a look at those ribs; they look like they’ve been crushed a bit. Are you finding it a bit difficult to draw deep breaths?” Thompson asked, suddenly all business.
Cloud shrank away slightly, as far as Zack would allow, but nodded in response to the question. He had found that since last night he had to take rather shallow breaths.
Thompson drew a stethoscope out of his bag, and gestured for Cloud to lean forward.
“Okay then, in that case I need to get a listen to your respiration.” Thompson muttered, half to himself and half to Zack and Cloud.
“Just lean forwards for me please.”
Zack gently pushed Cloud forwards and lifted his shirt for the medic, exposing Cloud’s carpet burn and scalding inflicted back.
Both SOLDIER’s grimaced at the raw flesh, and Thompson murmured,
“We’ll have to deal with that soon. For now, I’m afraid that this is going to sting a little.”
Cloud gasped and flinched away as cold metal touched hot, raw skin. He tried again to struggle out of Zack’s arms and away from the probing medic, but his friend simply shushed him, and tightened his grip, his thumb still keeping up a soothing, metronome stroking of Cloud’s arm.
“I’m just going to put my hand over your ribs; I need to see how far they can move.” Thompson explained, reaching around to gently squeeze Cloud’s ribs.
“Take a breath for me Cloud, as deep as you can. It’s gonna hurt, and I’m sorry, but it won’t take long.”
Cloud looked at Zack as if to implore him to stop this, but Zack just nodded his head, prompting him to breathe.
The blond scowled, but took as deep a breath as he could manage without it hurting. It was a shallow breath, even Cloud would admit that, but he just knew that if he drew in the tentative breath any more, he would be in pain.
“Come on Cloud, I need it to be deeper than that.” Thompson reprimanded gently.
Cloud’s eyes swivelled in shock. He let out his breath.
“If I breathe any deeper, it hurts.” He protested, trying to wiggle free of the grasp of the older men again.
Zack simply exerted a little more pressure, readjusting his hold on Cloud.
“I know it’s gonna be uncomfortable, but I need you to do this to see how badly your ribs are damaged.” Thompson explained calmly.
Cloud did nothing. He did not want to aggravate the injury…the pain from breathing too deeply had kept him awake for quite a while during the night.
“Come on Cloud.” Came Zack’s soft voice from the side. He petted Cloud’s hair. “If you just take one deep breath, Thompson can stop your ribs from hurting so badly.”
Cloud still had a very strong desire to simply run, but he knew that Zack was right; he just wanted the pain to abate.
He drew in a deep breath.
And felt a very sharp pain.
He immediately winced and wriggled a little, as if he could somehow shift his ribs to a more comfortable position.
He felt Thompson squeezing his ribs delicately, and heard Zack’s voice to his right tell him that he was a good Choco.
Choco; the nickname Zack had graced him with within one hour of meeting him. It usually pissed off Cloud. Now he just found it strangely comforting.
“That’s it Cloud, I just need you to try a little deeper.” Came Thompson’s voice.
Cloud whimpered. This hurt as it was, he couldn’t go any further.
Zack stroked Cloud’s now slightly sweat damp hair, feeling very sympathetic.
“You can do it Cloud, just a little more.” Zack encouraged, in a voice that was kind, but left no room for argument.
Cloud sucked in a little more breath and screwed his eyes tight at the pain.
Thompson again felt his ribs gently.
Cloud feared he would ask for a deeper breath still, but was relieved when he only said,
“Okay, that’s fine Cloud. You can breathe out now, but just do it slowly okay?”
Cloud had to employ his strongest self restraint to do as Thompson said and not just let out the air in one big gust.
Zack patted the blonde’s back, and then looked to Thompson, wordlessly asking for his findings.
“The ribs are quite severely bruised, but nothing is broken; but I’ll have to put a brace on them to keep them from moving too much; if they are subjected to any more stress they might crack.” The medic explained, rummaging around in his kit.
“But before I do that I’ll need to do something about his back and look over the rest of the more superficial wounds.”
Zack nodded, hoping that he could get Cloud to stay still for all this. He looked across to the boy, who was drawn up, with a look of pain and weariness and slight indignation at being poked and prodded. Definitely jumpy.
A healing materia would be quicker and easier. Zack thought wistfully. But I know that that’s pretty much out of the question, seeing as the bloody Shinra restricts use of materia to battle and field op only; any injuries at HQ have to do without the shinies. Stingy bastards.
Mind you, I can see their point; materia is like a lifeline in battle, and I know from painful first hand experience how…inconvenient a shortage can be.
Zack shuddered, remembering the times that he had cursed whoever was using materia when he needed it.
Besides, he thought again, there is only so much materia can do for something like this.
“Uh, Zack?”
Zack was pulled out of his musings by Thompson’s voice. It held a note of trepidation.
He looked around to see what the matter was, only to find Cloud curled up even tighter than before, his body thrumming with tension, everything about him exuding a message of, ‘Don’t touch me. If you touch me, I may just have to hurt you. You’ve done enough touching. Now go away.’
Zack licked his lip slightly nervously. He wasn’t quite sure how to go about this. Gentle handling was in order.
“Cloud?” He called softly. Cloud’s head snapped up unnaturally fast. He looked at Zack with wide, almost suspicious eyes.
“Aww, come on kiddo, don’t give me that look. I’m not here to hurt you, and neither is Thompson.” Zack pouted, hoping to lighten Cloud’s mood a little, and make him less tense.
It worked, partially, as Cloud’s muscles visibly relaxed a little, now that he was faced with the familiar sight of Zack joking around. But he refused to uncurl from his protective ball.
Thompson decided to speak up, now that Zack had soothed the boy down a little.
“Look Cloud, all I have to do is sort out that friction burn and scalding, and then clean the other, more minor wounds, then I’ll be able to put a brace on those ribs, and I’ll be done.” He coaxed, appealing to Cloud’s desire to get this over with, and put it behind him.
“All I’m gonna do is clean the burn, put some cream on it, and cover the worst area. That’s all.”
This seemed to appease Cloud, who eyed the medic warily for a while, and then nodded briefly.
Thompson then reached into his bag, bringing out a bottle of clear fluid and a white cloth. He overturned the bottle onto the piece of cloth, soaking it. He then turned to face the two other men.
“This is going to sting a little.” Thompson warned, more for the benefit of Zack, who heeded the warning by gripping Cloud’s arms in a comforting but confining hug.
Thompson then gently touched the sterilizer to Cloud’s raw flesh, and carefully wiped and dabbed at the skin of the cadet’s back.
Cloud’s eyes widened in shock for a moment, then he hissed viciously, wriggling wildly in Zack’s arms.
“Ow! That hurts! Let me go you bastard!” Cloud snarled, the pain momentarily blocking out anything but the desire to get away.
His hand shot out from Zack’s grip, and immediately went back to strike and claw desperately at Thompson, his snarls growing louder.
Zack caught the hand in mid swing, before it got to the medic, and tucked it back under his own arm, patting Cloud soothingly.
“Don’t hit him, Cloud, it’s not Thompson’s fault you’re hurting.” Zack said in the gentlest reprimand he could manage, while thinking that, actually, it was partially due to Thompson’s treatment that he was hurting.
But he wasn’t going to say this to Cloud.
Cloud continued to hiss and spit his discomfort in the SOLDIER’s hold, until they were finally done. Cloud’s cuts and bruises had been cleaned and bandaged, and he had a tight, material wrap going around his ribs to steady them.
When Thompson and Zack finally released him, Cloud scooted back to the end of his bed, curling in on himself, gently pawing at his injuries, and glaring out at the two of them. It reminded Zack somewhat of a cat licking its wounds.
Thompson stood up, and Zack followed him to the other side of the room, out of Cloud’s hearing range.
“His ribs aren’t broken, though they are severely bruised, and could end up breaking if they are put under any more strain for the time being. The brace should stop them from moving.” Thompson reported, Zack listening intently, arms folded, brow creased.
“The friction burn and scalding on his back is nasty; you’ll have to apply the sterilizer and cream every day, and re-do his bandages. The same goes for the cuts and bruises; you’ll need to clean them, and re-cover them. Let them get some air at night, but then cover them again in the morning.” Here Thompson ground to a halt, and looked from Zack, then back over to Cloud awkwardly.
Zack arched a questioning eyebrow.
“What? What is it?” He asked, a little anxious that Thompson was not telling him something.
Thompson shifted uneasily on his feet.
“Well…um, Zack…” He faltered, trying to find the words. The look on Zack’s face seemed to prompt them to come.
“Look, from what you said, and the way you’ve handled this, I’m guessing that someone…did more than just beat him up.” He looked over at Cloud, wincing at how nasty even the polite way sounded.
Zack closed his eyes and sighed. After a while he simply nodded shortly.
“Well…I think you know that it would be best if I…examined the…trauma site.” Thompson said delicately, not really used to dealing with anxious family and friends; his expertise was in the pure field medicine. His job was to patch people up either in the heat of battle, straight after the fight, or treat their long lasting injuries from war. It was someone else’s job to comfort worried friends and relatives.
Zack’s face screwed up. He could not imagine having to go through the discomfort and the indignity. And he wasn’t sure Cloud would go through with it.
“Aww man, he is not gonna like this.” Zack cursed, rubbing his hand through his hair.
He turned to Thompson.
“Look, I know where you are coming from, and I agree with you, but I’m not sure that Cloud will. I don’t know if he’ll agree to this.”
Thompson sighed.
“Well, I can understand why he wouldn’t want to do this, but it would be better in the long run. But understand I can’t perform the exam without his consent.” The medic explained. “Look, go over there, explain to him what’s gonna happen, and why it needs to be done, and see what he says. But we can’t force him.”
Zack nodded slowly and took a deep breath to brace himself, then walked back over to Cloud.
The blond was still curled up and sniffling occasionally, obviously very upset at the examination that had, in his view, been no better than an undignified and rather painful mauling. Zack sat down slowly, reaching out a hand to smooth down Cloud’s hair.
Cloud started at the touch, but quieted when he saw that it was only Zack, and he leaned into the older man’s touch.
Zack smiled, and carefully brought the blond to lean into his side, not sure whether Cloud would accept this.
As it was, the boy was pliant in Zack’s arms, and gladly rested against him, nuzzling Zack’s neck slightly.
The SOLDIER took a few moments to just let Cloud lean in silence, giving him a chance to calm down before he started his persuasion.
“Cloud?” he murmured when he felt the younger man’s pulse calm down.
“Mm?” came the sleepy murmur, and Zack looked down and saw that Cloud’s eyes were closed against his chest.
“Cloud…I think it would be a good idea if you let Thompson get a look at…the last injury.” Zack hesitated, not sure how to word it, and feeling very cautious.
Zack had been expecting an explosion of outrage and fear from Cloud. Had expected screaming and tears and struggling.
But none of those things came. Cloud was still against his friend’s chest, and he was perfectly silent.
Until he whispered something so quiet that Zack would not have heard, were it not for his Mako enhancements.
“Please Zack. No more. No more. Just let me go to sleep. It’s not hurting anymore. Just please. Let me sleep.”
It was not a scream. It was not a tantrum. It was not even really that forceful. It was just weary and pleading. And Zack found that it was also impossible to disagree with.
“Alright. Alright, Cloud. You don’t have to do anything else. You can sleep now.”
TBC