II: Mist and shadow
The building was unstable. Weapon had desecrated the upper floors, and while Meteor hadn’t actually hit it per se, the force of the blast had been enough to rip out whole sections from the side. Elena was acutely aware of this fact as she stepped through a door and found herself in the corridor with one entire side blown away, the supports creaking ominously as the wind howled past.
It was terrifying. There was a sheer sixty something storey drop to the ground, and the winds here were strong enough to pick you up and whip you out if you didn’t watch it.
Dimly, she recalled all those rumors of President Shinra tossing unfortunate employees and competitors out from the 70th floor. (“The old fat Shinra, you know. Not Junior. Junior’s too damn skinny to throw anyone out of the window.” “He fires a shotgun with one hand.” “Too prissy, then.”) Personally, she’d always thought that that was an exaggeration – one couldn’t even open the windows in that office… but there was always the helipad, right?
She told herself firmly that those were not screams she was hearing on the wind.
And Rufus… Rufus would have gotten them to walk off the helipad themselves.
She pressed herself flat against the wall as she inched forward, shivering slightly in the sudden cold. The sense materia was still tracking her target, who was moving swiftly through the floor ahead. Why he had gotten off the stairs on this particular floor and decided to hunt around was beyond her. Was it the 68th floor? She wasn’t quite sure; it was often hard to tell with the building folded in on itself, and whole floors inaccessible except holes drilled by other treasure hunters from higher floors.
A sparkle in the distance caught her eye, and she glanced down for a second. Midgar sprawled out under her, and from this height in the darkness you shouldn’t see the destruction, the wreckage. It was just dim and peaceful, with small islands of light shimmering beneath it. Not exactly awe inspiring, but—
Home. The place she’d exchanged for the ice-bound fields of the Icicle region. The city whose streets she had spent countless hours patrolling. The city whose many nooks and crannies she had become so familiar with, darting through the darkness, Tseng a dark blur in front, or Reno with his hair burning like a candle flame, or Rude, the glint of light off sunglasses as he turned back to see if she was keeping up.
She swallowed hard and made for the door again, glancing down to check the sense materia.
And cursed herself for getting distracted. Her target had turned back, and was making its way straight towards her.
It was hard to move through an unknown area in the darkness with any kind of speed whatsoever, but that was the very thing that Turks were trained to do. There wasn’t any conscious thought between registering the change in the situation before she was through the doorway, ducking down behind the desks beyond, the gun’s safety flicked off and trained on the haphazard path between desks and filing cabinets that the target was coming down.
Whoever it was, he was moving quickly.
I knew it.
This was the data center of the 68th floor, presumably where the science department stored its files. Someone was trying to dig up Shinra secrets. She was going to have to take him down.
She could see him – or maybe her, with long hair down to the waist caught in a loose pony tail at the nape of her neck – now. Moonlight illuminated the silhouette of someone moving confidently but silently down towards her, sidestepping the upturned tables and chairs with careless grace.
The target paused even before she could move, some instinct causing him or her to look up. Elena wasted no time on the curse that flicked briefly across her brain. Instincts kicked in, and she was over the desk in one bound, hand locked around the wrist of the other’s gun hand, and her own gun shoved up against the target’s skull.
“One move and—“
Spice. That lingering hint of a foreign scent, although he only ever wore Midgar cologne and rarely at that—
“Elena?”
Couldn’t be. Raven black strands right up against her face, stirring with every breath she took. That familiar broad-shouldered form – oh how could she have not recognized it, when she had spent so long standing behind him admiring that same profile – that voice, and it hurt, hurt far more than she could ever have expected…
Her fingers were still locked around her gun and his wrist, and he was still before her, not moving, even though she knew that he could shatter her grip in one move, and the question was whether she could shoot him before he did…
“Tseng-san?”
“Elena. If you please…”
“What are you doing here?”
A pause, and a low chuckle. “Once,
“That was four years ago, sir.”
“And things change, apparently. Relax. I was attempting to locate all of you and destroy any classified data remaining on the database.”
There was nothing to say to that, and her legs were getting weaker by the second. Once, she really would have dropped her gun on her feet, or sprung back, or embraced him, as unprofessional as that was, or at least to gush, or perhaps just gasp and stare in shock.
Instead she released him, holstered the pistol, stepped back, and clicked her heels together. “It’s good to see you again, sir.”
“At ease.” He turned, and the faint light from the windows fell on that face that had haunted her dreams. Tired. Weary. Smiling. Untouched by age, except that his hair was longer, and …
…She couldn’t help it. She smiled, through vision gone suddenly blurry, and her heart was in her throat.
And at last we come to hope unlooked for…
Hope and happiness and she was oh, oh so terrified that this was all a dream…
“Are any of the others alive?” Tseng asked.
“They survived the fall of Midgar, but I haven’t been in touch with them since, sir.”
“Elena, we passed the point of formality a long time ago. Shinra is no more, the Turks are gone…” he holstered the pistol that he had been carrying. “…call me Tseng.”
And then it broke on her that this was real. Of course, of course it had to be a Turk –who else could have gotten all the way up here? Her legs, already wobbly, gave, and she stumbled backwards a step to lean against a deck, helpless laughter bubbling up within her. And Tseng’s smile grew a little wider.
“It’s good to see you well.”
She gulped hastily for breath, half embarrassed at losing her composure like that. “How did you… we all thought you were dead.”
“A lot of luck. My PHS was dead, but Reeve called for air lift to Mideel before his Cait Sith got destroyed. Things are rather confused after that – I ended up in the care of those at Mideel, when the Lifestream abruptly decided to well up there. Which effectively destroyed any means of transport back to the main land. And then I heard about Diamond Weapon …” he paused, shaking his head. “By the time I was in a position to get back to Junon and try and contact any of you, it was too late. No one knew where you were. And when Meteor hit, I thought it was all over.”
“I’m so glad you’re alive,” she said, and it was a wonder he couldn’t see the blush that was burning all the way through her cheeks. Four years and still the rookie. Four years and still that unrequited crush hadn’t died… “But what do we do now?”
“We search. I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time searching for them here in Midgar. It’s time to branch out. We’re catching a flight to Junon.”
“A flight?”
“There’s a regular mail / cargo service that’s been running between Midgar and Junon…” He’d started walking again, and she fell in step with him out of sheer habit. As if all the time in between hadn’t existed and they were heading out again on a mission… she’d never thought that nostalgia would feel so good.
“Why were you searching so hard for us?”
“It wasn’t just you I was searching for.”
“Sir?”
He paused, just before the open corridor. “I’ll tell you more another time. That is, if you want to come with me.” And he glanced back. “Forgive me for assuming, but…”
“Of course.” What else could she say? Wasn’t this the very reason she had set out from Kalm for, this sense of sheer belonging and rightness that nothing else in the world could give her? “The Company may be gone, but a Turk is a Turk for life.”
Tseng’s eyes crinkled in a smile that was somehow sad. “Then let’s go.”