a man may drink and not be drunk

[exsurgo]

[ 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.

Comments

[exsurgo]

Oh, I'm ready! I don't have pants, but that's a problem for everybody else to deal with on their own terms.

[ Actually, the list of things he doesn't have is pretty short, if he thinks of it as:

1: everything

but somehow, that doesn't seem important right now. He's here, and Cloud's here, and he's getting out of hospital. Everything else is just details. And honestly, he's pretty impressed by Cloud. The sure, confident way he says they can blow the joint, the offer to go talk on Zack's behalf? It's what Zack always saw in him, just waiting to come to the surface.

And it's kinda hot. ]

[disheroic]

[ 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.

[exsurgo]

[ It's weird that the feeling of general grossness doesn't properly kick in until Cloud mentions taking a shower. Then, suddenly, he feels like he's covered in a think film of yuck. Not as much as he might have expected, though, and as far as he can tell he doesn't smell, which raises the mildly horrifying spectre of spongebaths.

Yeah, he's glad that Cloud seems all set to get him out of here before he speaks too much with a medical professional.

But just like with the water, once he's in the shower (with Cloud's assistance to get there) everything else is forgotten. There's a plastic chair in the shower stall but he resists using it, wanting to prove to himself that he doesn't have to. But there's enough to make sure that doesn't feel like a struggle; he washes his body and gives a little sigh of pleasure when he feels properly clean, washes his hair too and savors the feeling of his fingers against his scalp, the fresh feeling left behind. It's good, but it's also the first point at which the knowledge that he was out for three years feels real to him; every sensation is intense, to the point where he's sure he can feel individual soap bubbles popping on his skin.

And as intense as that is, he still spends only a very brief time in the chair, and it's more in the name of relaxing than needing it. And when he's done he picks out an outfit from the offerings in the bag, trying to be on his best behavior when he chooses jeans instead of sweats, even if he decides to complement that with a black tank. And then there's nothing to do but wait patiently as a watchdog for Cloud to return. ]