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Zack Fair ([personal profile] exsurgo) wrote in [community profile] fourstrings2020-08-01 11:07 pm

a man may drink and not be drunk



[ 1;

It bleeds together. Days after endless days, blurring into one another because none of them really matter until Cloud wakes up. Not that he doesn’t value each and every one of them, every day that he and Cloud make it through unscathed. And the end – that bleeds together, too. He remembers putting Cloud down behind an outcropping, trying to keep him sheltered, ruffling his hair. More men than he could have imagined standing before him. Against him. Fighting until he could feel himself starting to slow, hot bursts of pain, falling. And Cloud’s face. Cloud’s voice, telling him no, but it’s such a backwater name -

no. That was before. He isn’t remembering right. Cloud is here, but he’s mako poisoned. He can’t move without help, that’s why -

no, he did move, he crawled over and Zack told him -

told him -

he can’t remember. Could, if it was quiet, if he could hear his thoughts over the underwater whoosh of his own pulse in his ears. But at least it’s warm - why is it warm? It’s cold, the rain and the hard ground beneath him and the chill he knows is from blood loss -

his body feels light. Like floating. Dying, must be. That’s why he said all of that, right? He got to see Cloud one last time, that’s something. He would like to see him again, but he’s tired. He’ll sleep, and then

2;

beep. beep. beep. His alarm? He’s too tired to get up, too woozy, must have only just fallen asleep -

not an alarm. A monitor. Infirmary? The antiseptic tickle of the air he breathes in says yes. Opens his eyes. Fluorescent light, stiff white sheets, a rattly cot. Oh. Infirmary for him, then. His chest hurts. How did we wind up here, huh? he asks, coughs around it, finds his voice creaky and stale. Cloud’ll forgive him, he’s sure. And Cloud is -

not here. He calls. Then shouts. Then pulls a needle from his arm and starts peeling off sticky tabs – good thing he was never prone to chest hair – ignores the way the monitors trade their beeps for screams one after the other, swings his feet out of bed just as a whitecoated woman appears in the doorway. Cloud, he insists, where’s Cloud, and she lifts her open hands and walks toward him and asks him to sit down, please, Mr Fair, you’ve been through quite the ordeal just as he pushes up and off the bed and he falls and bowls into her, knocks them both to the floor. Running, then, the sound of hard soles on polished floors, hands under his arms to lift him up and a face he recognizes as friend-turned-threat. Threat? He wondered, thought maybe not -

but Cloud is gone, and nobody gets a pass until Zack knows where he is. He shouts something, takes a swing. His arms get pinned to his sides and there’s the bite of a needle and just enough time to think the prick sedated me and then

3;

easier, this time, the light, floating feeling of his body solidifying, settling into itself and all his constituent parts in a way that feels less woozy, less garbled. There are still beeps, and when he cracks his itchy, dust-dry eyes open the lights are still fluorescent. The air still prickles of hospital. And his first thought is still Cloud but this time, when he turns his head to look for the needle and pull it out -

there he is. Cloud. Slumped unmoving in a chair, like Zack had so long to get used to, but dressed differently. Accessorized. Zack laughs, and it sounds like rust, but he means it. ]


There you are.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-01 05:41 pm (UTC)(link)
[ cloud is in the hospital for the better part of two weeks before zack finally wakes.

and it's not an easy thing -- he hasn't been able to stand hospitals or doctors for years, and just that sharp antiseptic smell is enough to go prying into the murky corners of his mind where his nightmares lay half-buried. but the nurses and doctors here know enough to give him a wide berth, and even if they didn't? it's zack. and to see him again, to watch the steady rise-and-fall of his chest and know that he's alive, would be more than enough to make cloud submit to much greater torments.

there are too many people who rely on his delivery service to pause business altogether, but he off-loads some of the work to tifa and most to the turks, and conducts the rest from his new temporary HQ in zack's hospital room. it's mostly paperwork, route planning, and balancing the ledgers, and it helps to have something to do that's not just staring at zack and waiting for him to wake up. keeping himself busy also keeps him from focusing on the things he shouldn't; the hospital around him, the reality that zack might never wake up, the fear that he might not be himself when he does.

(cloud has seen too many shells of former SOLDIERs in the days since shinra fell -- vacant-eyed and hollowed out, often babbling weakly about their reunion, some so sick and twisted by JENOVA's influence that there was nothing left to do but put them down like the rest of hojo's creations.)

cloud has never been an optimist. but for this? for zack? he hopes.

tifa tells him it isn't healthy to stay here around the clock, that he should come home sometimes to rest, but she never pushes the issue. cloud knows she's right, but he also can't -- the idea of zack waking up alone tears at him, and he thinks she gets that. so she brings it up every day when she visits, but it's almost a perfunctory thing. like she has to worry about him because there's no one left who will, bringing him homecooked meals and staying to watch him eat because she knows he won't if she doesn't. but she never presses the issue as hard as cloud knows she could, and he knows it's her way of reminding him that she's there.

and in the end? the vigil is nearly pointless, because cloud isn't there the first time zack wakes.

not that he's far -- another floor of the hospital, crowded into a room with doctors and a few of the scientists on reeve's team, arguing back and forth amongst themselves about zack's prognosis. what counts as a good sign to one of them seems to spell doom for another, and the bickering is enough to drive the spike of a headache into cloud's skull. the meeting seems more like pointless speculation than anything else, and he's just on the verge of calling it quits when --

the cacophony of a roomful of pagers going off at once. the sounds of shouting, a struggle.

-- and cloud arrives just in time to see zack slump back to unconsciousness in tseng's hold.

after that? he's relentless in his vigil. refuses to leave zack's room for any reason, does his best to even keep from sleeping for fear that zack will wake up again and cloud will miss it. but even mako-enhanced bodies have their limits, and he doesn't even realize he'd fallen asleep when a voice jolts him back awake again.

there you are.

full awareness in an instant, eyes sharp as they make a quick scan of the room, and then --

everything softens when his gaze finds zack's face, finds him awake and looking back at him.

the relief that tears up through his chest is almost too powerful to bear; cloud is stunned by the force of it, unable to do anything else for a few long seconds but stare at the man in front of him. and then he swallows hard and sits up, reaching out instinctively for zack's hand before flinching back like he's not sure he's allowed. ]


Zack.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-01 08:37 pm (UTC)(link)
Hey.

[ there's so much more that he wants to say, but it catches behind the swelling in his throat and refuses to resolve itself into spoken words. but there's no hesitation this time in the way he reaches for zack's hand -- catches it in both of his and wraps his hands around it like it's something unspeakably precious, punctuating the gesture with a little squeeze.

it almost makes him laugh, zack asking how're you doing? like cloud's the one worth being worried about. but that's zack all over -- he always put cloud first, even when it didn't make sense, even when there's no one else who would've. and the familiarity makes him ache all the way down into his bones; after everything he's been through, it's too much to hope that zack will just be okay, but -- ]


I'm good. [ rubbing the pad of his thumb gently along the side of zack's hands -- wishing he'd remembered to take off the gloves, but there's no way he's letting go long enough to fix that now. ] You okay?
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-01 09:02 pm (UTC)(link)
Good to hear yours, too.

[ and there's a part of him that's almost wary of closing the distance -- there's no way of knowing how much zack will remember, what he'll be okay with, but. the sight of those tears is enough to make the decision for him; he's out of the chair and sitting on the edge of the bed before he can question himself, freeing up a hand so that he can reach out and gently wipe the tears away from the corners of zack's eyes.

it's good just to touch him. to confirm for himself that he's warm and real, too solid to just be cloud's mind playing tricks on him again.

the pragmatic part of him knows that he should go and alert one of zack's doctors to the fact that he's awake, make sure he's checked over properly and tended to. but it's been so long, and there's a selfish urge to steal just a few more minutes alone with him. ]
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-01 09:50 pm (UTC)(link)
[ he's not a teenager anymore. so there's no excuse for the way something as simple as i really wanna kiss you should make his heart stutter in his chest and his cheeks tint with heat. but it's also zack, back from the dead and remembering him well enough to want to kiss him, so maybe that's enough to cut himself a break.

still --

water. ]


Yeah, hang on. [ another quick squeeze of zack's hand, this time almost like an apology, and then he stands up and breaks the contact. one of the nurses was nice enough to drag a mini-fridge for him after a few days of camping out here, and he's lucky that it's been kept stocked with water bottles. so he crouches there long enough to grab one -- then two, just in case -- before he heads back to zack, settling himself back on the edge of the bed and cracking the seal on one of the caps. ]

Think you can sit up?
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 12:11 am (UTC)(link)
[ cloud keeps a steadying hand on zack's back as the other man works to sit himself upright, watching carefully for any sign that the strain is too much. the SOLDIER healing process is legendary for a reason, but after what zack went through? cloud would much rather be safe than sorry.

so it's a relief when zack manages the task of sitting upright (mostly) on his own, but cloud doesn't waste any time rearranging the bed and pillows behind him to lean back on if he needs it. and then he reaches out to hook his foot around one of the legs of the tray-table, hauling it a little closer and putting the second water bottle on it for now. ]


For awhile. [ then he nudges the water bottle into zack's hand insistently. ] Water first, questions later.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 12:45 am (UTC)(link)
[ yep, that's why cloud grabbed the second bottle.

and it's probably dumb to feel so fond about watching someone chug water, but there it is. just being able to see zack again is better than anything cloud could've asked for -- watching him move, hearing him talk, real and warm and undeniably alive. it makes something in his chest ache with tenderness; it's like the part of him that's always been in love with zack only needed this to burst into bloom all over again, and cloud has forgotten entirely how to handle it.

he wants to kiss zack. he wants to wrap zack up in his arms and promise that cloud is going to protect him this time. he wants to curl up with zack in the narrow hospital bed and run his fingers over every inch of him, just for the joy of confirming that he's here.

... what he does, instead, is swap zack's empty water bottle out for the spare. ]


Here. [ softly, fondness undeniable in every syllable. ] Slower, this time.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 01:41 am (UTC)(link)
[ cloud doesn't remember a lot about the time he and zack spent together. a lot of what's left is just impressions -- feeling warm, feeling safe, feeling loved. sometimes there are more concrete memories, but they play back to him like the footage from a damaged film reel -- the video cuts and jumps in places it shouldn't, the audio is missing half the time, and it's hard to make sense of much.

even still. this flirting echoes back to him like something he knows, and the way it makes his heart skip is something familiar. ]


You sure? [ because he can't help but want to be careful with him. but he also doesn't want zack to think it's because cloud doesn't want to, which is why he reaches out to put an arm on zack's forearm. gives him a little squeeze like it's a silent reassurance. ] You've been through a lot.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 02:30 am (UTC)(link)
[ it's stupid to be nervous. and maybe nervous doesn't exactly fit the bill -- it's a blend of nerves and anticipation, all blurred together and beating feathery little wings in his chest.

but if he's learned one thing from (nearly?) losing zack, it's that he never wants to pass up on a chance to kiss him again. so he leans in to answer that question, curling the fingers of one hand lightly at the nape of zack's neck and leaning in to press their mouths together. he makes a point to keep it chaste, soft and sweet but short -- but that doesn't stop it from hitting him like a punch to the chest, knocking the breath out of his lungs and making him ache.

and even when he breaks it, he stays right where he is, bumping their foreheads together gently. there's a lump in his throat that almost feels like it might be tears, but he does his best to level out the edges of his voice when he snorts a little laugh and says: ]


Gross. Morning breath.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 03:13 am (UTC)(link)
[ what he should do is go find a doctor. it's important that zack gets checked out, and that has to take priority over the urge to wrap himself up around him and never let go again.

but zack asks him, and it's almost a helpless thing. because there's very little in the world that cloud wouldn't do for zack, especially now, and... well, the inner battle really only lasts as long as it takes cloud to flick a quick look at the door, and then he's giving in.

careful, though. zack has an IV hooked up to one arm, so cloud settles in on his other side and makes a pointed effort to keep from jostling him as much as possible. whatever had happened to zack, he's healed from the worst of the wounds that cloud remembers -- but that doesn't stop cloud from wanting to err on the side of caution, to be careful with him. of course, that doesn't mean that he can't lean into zack once he's there, bumping their shoulders together and smiling crookedly over at him. ]


Hey. Sleeping Beauty.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 03:41 am (UTC)(link)
[ it isn't a question with easy answers. and cloud almost wishes there was a way of pushing the conversation off entirely -- zack might even let him, if cloud was firm enough about it. but cloud also knows what it's like to feel like you have pieces of your own timeline missing; he knows what it's like to wake up not knowing, and it seems like the least he can do for zack is be there to slot the missing parts in for him.

still, it's not an easy thing, and nothing that'll come after will get any easier.

he drops his eyes down to zack's hand, takes it gently in his own and rubs his thumb across the other man's knuckles. doesn't look up when he answers, voice quiet. ]


Three years.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 03:58 am (UTC)(link)
Three years.

[ give or take. there'd been a few stretches in there where he wouldn't really call himself awake, but that's... another story.

and he finally lifts his eyes back to zack's. ]
What's the last thing you remember?
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 04:40 am (UTC)(link)
[ their memories match up there, at least. it's a little disappointing that zack can't tell him how he ended up back at that lab -- then again, given their experience, maybe that's for the better. the less memories he has of places like that, the better. he doesn't want to wish them on zack. ]

Yeah. You -- [ he pauses for a second, because for all the damage done to most of his memories, that one came back to him crystal clear. he can still smell the mix of blood and gunpowder if he closes his eyes, still hear the wet rattle of zack's breath in his chest. he remembers the moment zack died, remembers the way the light went out of his eyes and his hand fell limp to the ground. ] I... remember that, too.

[ a little shake of his head. ] But I... was still pretty sick. My head was messed up for awhile.

[ it's the only explanation he can think of. that he'd been so fucked up by the mako and the trauma that he'd gotten it wrong, taken zack's death for granted. which... leads way to another pretty horrible realization. ] ... I left you there.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 05:12 am (UTC)(link)
[ cloud knows zack's right, but it doesn't stop the guilt from eating at him. fortunately, guilt is one thing he's had a hell of a lot of practice in dealing with, and he knows that sometimes you have to make a conscious decision not to indulge it before it chews a hole in you. so he breathes in, out, and makes a concerted effort to shove the idea that he wasn't there for zack when zack needed him down and away.

he'll deal with it later. right now? he is here, and that's what he wants to focus on.

so he turns a little, leaning in to press a kiss against zack's temple and give his hand another little squeeze. ]


You're worth the wait. Always have been.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-02 11:18 pm (UTC)(link)
[ nothing about this is going to be easy. a lot has changed in three years -- cloud has changed, even though he only has muddy memories to go by. and there's a chance that zack will realize that and decide that this isn't the cloud he wants to be with, isn't the same one he fell in love with all those years ago.

but for now? zack puts his head on cloud's shoulder, and cloud can reach up and run his fingers gently through the other man's hair, and it feels like the closest he's been to okay in a long, long time.

... and yeah, it's impossible to forget that this is zack. the proof is there every time he opens his mouth. ]


Your face is fine. [ turning to press a little kiss up against his hairline, mouth twitching into something that's almost a smile. ] But they definitely scrambled your brain.
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-03 06:11 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah. [ with a little roll of his eyes -- absolutely ineffective when that stolen little kiss is enough to have him smiling. ] I'm totally immune.

[ but that question? easy answer. ] We leave as soon as you're ready.

[ there will be plenty of protests on the subject, without a doubt, but he isn't letting anyone keep zack trapped somewhere he doesn't want to be. not again, not ever. thinking about it is enough to make his expression grow serious, head tipping slightly to one side as he considers. ] You want me to go talk to 'em?
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[personal profile] disheroic 2020-08-05 09:55 pm (UTC)(link)
[ cue a snort at that problem. luckily, tseng is nothing if not meticulous, and he'd already addressed that issue before cloud had even had a chance to think of it. ]

There's some clothes in the bag. [ nodding towards a duffel bag parked on the chair in the corner as he stands up, circling around the bed and back to the chair he's been using as basecamp for the past few days. luckily, he can afford to travel pretty light, so there's not a ton to pack back up. ]

If you feel up to it, you can grab a shower while I'm talking to the doctors. It'll probably take a minute.