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Chapter Thirty-Two: Flight

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Cloud found himself in a hallway, having no real recollection having actually walked there.  He remembered going through the motions of walking, making sure he didn't bump into anyone in the halls or the elevators, but his surroundings were hazy.  He didn't even remember what button he pressed, but when the cart stopped in the elevator shaft and the doors opened, he walked out briskly without even knowing what floor he was on.  For all he knew, the floor that he wandered onto could have been restricted, but somewhere in the back of his mind, he told himself that he was okay where he was.

And he heard his thoughts through the haze, and it was frightening to know that they were so calm-sounding while the rest of his body was reacting as if panic was consuming him, and he struggled to get a handle on his surroundings.  He knew he had found a short hallway where there were just a few supply closets, and now he was leaning his back up against the wall in it.  

Voices were beginning to flood his mind, and now the once unclear images of his memory began to assemble.  He remembered Graves; he saw Graves … standing over a form of what he assumed was Mejia, surrounded by heat and fire.  He remembered feeling someone holding him, and pieced Ratcliff's voice to that person.  They briefly talked – about him – and then Graves left.  The form on the ground was gone, and then all he was able to scrounge up in his mind was numbness, and darkness.

That one memory he had of protecting and protection … it was finally coming back to him as well.  It was Ratcliff's lie, and the word itself repeated to him over any other thought he had at that moment.  It was surreal, to hear it and to realize it with everything else swarming him.  Visuals, both real and metaphysical, continued the flood on his mind.  The sounds from his memories and the ambience around drowned his senses, overloading any connection he was trying to make to steady himself.

He was holding his head, as if it was the only thing he could do.  He tried to focus on the cold feeling of the wall on his back as he slid to the ground, attempting to pull himself away from everything else.  There was a forming pain in his head, starting at his temples where his jaw was clenched, then radiating behind his eyes and up from there.  It was dull, slowly increasing with his disorientation.

"Cloud?"  The psychologist stood at the end of the hallway, looking at him in disbelief.  "Cloud, what happened!?"  She rushed to his side, dropping a gym towel from her arm as she reached out, grabbing Cloud's hands that were on his head.

He couldn't hear her.  He only felt her grip his hands, and instinct, perhaps more of a habit, took over and he began to resist her.  He felt cornered – trapped in this hallway, someone using their weight to fight him, to manipulate his body for whatever purpose.  He didn't want to know the purpose, and he thrashed in an attempt to shake the person who was holding him.  Mejia, pain, rape.  Now more words circling his mind with lie.

The psychologist was shoved away with an incoherent yell, but as fast as he shook her off, she was back with her hands on his, sinking down as he slid further to the ground.  "Cloud, Cloud it's me, Dr. Arolin!"  She fought with him as his hands moved from the sides of his head to cover his eyes and mouth.  "Cloud, look at me.  Look at me."  Moments passed of her coaxing his hands down through his dissipating resistance, whether it was from exhaustion or his senses coming around that she managed to get them lowered, she wasn't sure at first.

But she knew, once he slowly opened his eyes and their gaze met, that his senses were coming around.  His eyes were unfocused, but clearly held everything he was experiencing in them.  And he suddenly sank down to the ground, and she sank with him, her hands still clutching his tightly.

"What's wrong?  What happened?"

His breathing was ragged and quick, his shoulders pitching with each awkward breath.  "Graves …"

"I need you to take deep breaths for me, please.  You're going to faint breathing like this," she said, her voice calm, yet holding a hint of pleading.

"Graves …" he managed to say through the breaths that he failed to calm, despite her instructions.

Her eyes flickered across him with uncertainty.  "Cloud, you're not making any sense.  I need you to calm down so I can help you."

"He was there."

"Are you remembering something?"  The grip on his hands tightened.

He nodded his head weakly with tears in his eyes as he looked around in a daze.  He finally began to notice her, and it wasn't until after a few seconds of idle staring did he realize who it was that was with him.

Why was she here?  It was her day off, and this was the …

Cloud then realized he had no idea where he was.  He could see through his blurred vision that she was in a jogging suit, with her long blonde hair pulled through a cap that she wore, and now he could hear the sounds of weight machines clanking in whatever room that was behind him.  He had somehow made it to the sixty-fourth floor where there was a gym and rest area for employees.  She must have been working out on her day off.

"Please," she said, leaning close to him, "tell me what you remember."

He blinked a few times, thankful that the tears began to disappear on their own without falling down his face.  But through a clearer vision, he finally got a good look at the woman up close, as in the past he always had avoided her gaze.  She was no longer wearing her reading glasses, and her eyes were large and … kind.  They were laced with a concern that only a mother would have.  He had never really seen her this animated over him before, and he wondered why now, of all times, was she showing more human emotions towards him, versus a professional and almost robotic attitude.  Perhaps she was just as stunned to see him as he was to see her.

She really did remind him of his own mother, and the more that she looked at him, the longer that she held his hands firmly, the more he felt the urge to talk to her, to tell her every big and little thing on his mind.  He wanted for her to say something – anything – that would make him feel better, even if it was only temporary.  And it must have showed, for now her thumb on one of his hands was tenderly stroking him, coaxing him to speak.

But, he really didn't know what to say.  "Ratcliff … he lied to me," was all he managed.

"About what, Cloud?"  Her voice came out soft, almost a whisper.

"He said that …" Cloud swallowed hard, fighting back the urge to begin crying in what he could only assume would be in a very pathetic way.  "... our friend Graves got promoted to SOLDIER and that he was in boot camp.  But he deserted.  He was in Kalm …"

There was a brief silence, and she slowly but confidently began to speak, keeping her eyes locked on him.  "That's right," she finally said.  "He was there."

Cloud frowned, trying to make sense of the sudden change of composure in her voice.  "You … knew?"

"Yes, I knew.  Your superior, Kunsel, informed me of what happened."

"But, why would you," he said, shaking his head, his eyes narrowing in thought, "a-and Ratcliff kept that from me?"

"You had to remember on your own, Cloud.  We can't tell you what to remember."

He was quiet for quite some time, looking as if he was struggling to piece together everything.  "But … if you guys told me in the first place, I would have remembered eventually."

"How would you know if what we told you was the truth?" she said firmly, yet somehow tenderly.  

"I-I don't know."

She sighed a little, easing the grip on his hands, but still held them in place.  "When Mr. Ratcliff lied to you, what did you feel?"

"That he was lying to me, what else?" he said quickly, irritated.

"But you knew in your gut that something wasn't right, correct?"

"Yeah …"

"And that made you search your mind for the correct answer, and you remembered on your own," she said, almost sounding sure of herself if she hadn't been speaking so gently.

"No!  That's the thing!"  Cloud began to struggle within her grasp, and even though she was holding him lightly, he felt as if he had no energy to break free.  Anger was lingering, little by little getting ready to topple over and spill.  "Two guys who were on the same mission with me just told me!  Your logic is wrong!"

"My logic is not wrong, Cloud.  Please, understand.  Unforeseen circumstances might have helped you remember, but you were on the right track on your own, regardless."  She leaned down to try and keep the eye contact that Cloud was desperately trying to break as he looked towards his lap.  "You knew something wasn't right about what your friend was telling you, and you were starting to realize on your own that there was more to it than what he was letting on."

Cloud scoffed, managing to break one had free from hers to tug at his muffler.  He was beginning to feel trapped between the wall behind him and the psychologist in front of him.  A combination of his own body heat from his anxiety and her body heat from being so close was getting to him.  "No, he's just a lying rat bastard.  That's all he is."

"He did lie to you, yes."  She tried to grab his hand again, but he tucked it underneath one of his thighs as if trying to hide it.

"Why would he lie to me?"

She was silent again, and that eye contact that she was able to hold was finally broken of her own will, and she looked to the main corridor where voices from the gym and lounge area flowed from.  "He was ordered to, Cloud."

Ordered …?

He was almost afraid to ask, and when he did, there was a slight tremor to his voice.  "Who would order him to lie to me …?"

Their eyes met.  "I did."

He stared at her blankly at first, but as those simple words registered in his cluttered mind, he found himself shoving her away from him.  "What!?"

The psychologist caught herself from falling backwards, and she pushed herself up before grabbing at Cloud who was now trying to scramble to his feet.  "Cloud, please, calm down."

"I knew it!" he said, and with each pant in between, his voice began to rise.  "I knew I couldn't trust you!"

"Cloud, listen to me.  When you first woke up in the infirmary, you didn't remember a thing!  I was there with you and you couldn't even remember where you were at first!"

"So you ordered one of my best friends to lie to me!?"

"You had to remember on your own, Cloud."

"Just please, leave me alone right now!"  He shook his arm, knocking her hand off as it tried to squeeze and hold him, possibly to restrain him.  "I don't want to talk to you anymore!"

"I understand that you're upset, and you have every right to be.  But please, try to see that it was for your best interest."

Cloud got to his feet, swaying, and he growled at her when she stood with him, holding onto his shoulders to steady him.  He just pushed her away angrily.  "Please, just get away!"

She gave him a sympathetic look and paused for what seemed like an hour.  It looked as if she were trying to think of what to do or say, trying to decide on some sort of course of action that would help him.  But after a few moments, she reluctantly dropped her hands from his shoulders and took a step back, allowing him room to pass in the narrow hallway.

He paused for a moment as well, as if giving her a chance to try and reconcile the situation, but that moment passed too quickly before she could act, and he took off running down the hall towards the elevator.  He couldn't stop himself, even if he wanted.  He was fleeing towards the one place that he had for the past few days … weeks … when things got too rough.

"Cloud!" he heard her call, "Don't be mad at him!"

He assumed she meant Ratcliff, but at that point, he really could care less.

~*~*~
It took Graves longer than he would have hoped to realize that Mejia had grabbed his wrist and stopped him from slicing his neck open like how he originally – and rather quickly – planned.  It wasn't until the body beneath him moved faster than he could predict, and until he felt himself being hurled from the bed did things begin to register.

He crashed through the bedside cart, his weight causing the frame to not catch him or steady him as he reached out to it, but to shatter like an eggshell.  He felt his arms being sliced by the metal frame as he fell into it, crushing it beneath him.  A few of the casters popped off as he hit, causing them to shoot out in several different directions and skid along the tiled floor.  He watched as one was stopped in its path as Mejia stood up from the bed and kicked it away.

Graves ignored the stinging pain in his arms as he got up, gaining his balance back as fast as he could, but Mejia was already grabbing the tank top he wore, pulling him towards him as he readied to strike.  He struggled to gain a steady footing as he fought back, catching Mejia's wrist in his hand before he could hit him.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Mejia said, grunting as he tried to pry his fist away from Graves'.  He leaned forward, causing Graves to stagger under his strength.

"Ain't it obvious?  What else is a man tryin' to do when he's holdin' a blade to yer neck?"

"Sure fuckin' glad I was awake.  I'd hate to be killed by someone like you."

"A piece of shit like you don't have a say in who gets to kill ya.  That choice ain't gonna be yers … ya ain't that privileged."  Graves gripped the knife in his hand tight as he brought it up to Mejia's gut where a thick layer of bandages was wrapped around.  He wanted to reopen that wound, to grind that blade around every inch of the man's vital organs – and perhaps, even the not so vital – and make him bleed out.  Whatever sick thought he had previously envisioned in his mind on his journey, he would make sure to actually play out for his own enjoyment.  But Mejia grabbed his wrist once more, and now they were locked.

They struggled within each other's strength, trying to find some means of overpowering.  Several attempts were made to toss each other away, but the other would simply counter with another grapple, or with a shifting of their weight.  The knife was trying to be taken from Graves' hand, or at least forced to be dropped.  

Graves wasn't about to let Mejia get the knife, even if it meant the man were to break his arm trying.  But the more they struggled, the more he began to struggle in just keeping his balance.  Even wounded, Mejia was impressively strong … maybe even incredibly strong.  He knew he was formidable, but even back when Mejia was the same rank, he still could be taken down when at full strength.  Did the mako and Jenova cells really play that much of a role in differentiating their skill level?

Blood was running down his arms and dripping quickly onto the floor.  He wasn't sure how deep the metal frame had cut him, or even if it had hit any important veins.  It could have been the strain on his arms, or even his heart rate that was causing the blood to fall that fast.  But he noticed that there was a red stain beginning to form on Mejia's stomach beneath the bandages as well, and the once calm look on his face was starting to turn.

"How bad is it?"  Graves said, nodding to his stomach.

Mejia grunted.  "S'not bad.  I'll be up and running in no time."

"Runnin' … ya sure do a lot of that.  Shoulda stuck around last time we saw each other."

"Well, I had a ride to catch, much like I do now.  Have places to go–"

"An' people to rape and kill?"

Mejia smirked wide, laughing a little dryly.  "Something like that."

Graves suddenly let out a yell, bringing his leg up between them and kicking Mejia in the stomach.  The man's grip on Graves' arm was lost, and as he staggered back, the hold on his tank top was gone as the fabric went with him.  He didn't fall like how Graves was hoping he would, but instead recovered and lunged forward, despite the now open wound in his gut.  Mejia went to grab Graves' shirt again, but it was now torn and hanging in pieces around his shoulders.  This gave Graves enough time to try and dodge the man's next swift movement as it looked as if he was going for his throat.  

Mejia growled and quickly righted his attack, taking Graves by the base of his neck.  His fingertips curled into his jugular and collarbone.  Graves sputtered, his airway disrupted and panic began to swarm him.  If his collarbone was to break, he would have one hell of a time trying to fight this man.  But he couldn't think fast enough, and he couldn't react fast enough.  He found himself being hoisted up by the neck and tossed against the hospital bed.  His legs buckled as he hit, and he toppled over it, stunned.

He twisted his body to his side to stand.  He saw Mejia out of the corner of his eye scramble for something on the ground, and at first Graves thought that it was his knife, but it was still surprisingly gripped in his hand.  By the time his senses collected, Mejia was standing above him with one of the casters in his hand.  It was brought down and the stem was plunged deep into Graves' thigh.  Pain erupted within his flesh, and Mejia had stabbed him with it with such a force that the blunt object managed to not only pierce his skin, but drive deep into the muscle.  

"Now, hold still, you fuck," Mejia said, panting.  He staggered over to his belongings in the corner of the room, taking his broadsword up into his hand.  "Since I don't have my gun anymore, looks like I'll have to slice your head off."

Graves gritted his teeth as he got to his feet.  He let out a gasp as Mejia swung his sword over his head, bringing it down at him.  He could feel a gust of air pass him from the movement as the blade cleaved through the bed with little effort.  He stumbled off to the side, reaching down and ripping the caster from his thigh with a restrained cry.  He turned when he sensed Mejia was recovering from the attack.  He was able to dodge another swing of the sword at him.

He soon found his back colliding with a few pieces of medical equipment, and he clumsily reached out at them to steady himself.  He was able to stay on his feet as he clutched an IV stand.  It began to slide under his weight, throwing his balance.  The room was too cluttered and too compact to gain any shred of sense, and Mejia was faster than Graves could have expected.  The pain in his arms and legs were not competing with his determination, so it went ignored as he took the IV stand in his hands.  

He spun around, managing to deflect Mejia's sword away from his body, but it easily cut the stand in two and sent the top half crashing against the wall next to them.  The tubes from the IV flew past between them, causing enough distraction for Graves to have time to thrust the other half of the stand into Mejia's wound.  

Mejia let out a guttural cry as it sank deep into his gut.  It was a clean cut that his sword had made on the metal stand, so finding an equally clean path into an already open wound was easy.  It was enough for Graves to feel as if the upper hand would soon be his, and enough for his confidence to begin soaring.

"Hope this feels as wonderful as it looks," Graves said, twisting it to quickly bring about another satisfying noise from Mejia's throat.  "Sure as hell sounds wonderful on this end."

Mejia attempted to say something, but another noise, almost like a gurgle, came from him instead of any actual words.  It was a beautiful sound indeed, harmonizing with the sickening squish of his flesh and organs around his makeshift weapon.  He relished the soft sound of the man's blood drip onto the tile, he savored the look of agonizing pain contorting on his face.  Graves really couldn't ask for a more gratifying view of this man.

It truly was impossible to look away, and with each moment, the shiv was inching its way further into Graves' revenge.  There would be no lessons to be taught or to learn from any of this, no hesitation or reflecting on it.  It was just as coldblooded and ruthless as Mejia himself, and was nothing more than the simple concept of an eye for an eye.  And then the moment that he would stop breathing, Graves would turn and simply walk away, letting it all go.  No more dwelling, no more boiling anger, Mejia's existence in Graves' mind would be gone with that last breath.

He had imagined the man's death in his mind a few times, and with each vision, it only helped to affirm his decision and the justice he sought out.  He would carry this out no matter what the cost or the casualty, even despite this setting not being what he pictured or the weapon he carried it out with, he had to admit that he was becoming quite pleased with everything.

But Mejia grabbed the middle of the IV stand and began to forcefully pull it out of his stomach.  His muscles trembled with such blind fury that the flowing blood from his wound was splattering further from the small puddle that had formed on the floor.  And as he started to overpower Graves' strength, the tip of the metal stand was now slipping from his body, and with it, Graves' goal slipped as well.

Graves was shoved back as Mejia finally pulled it from his gut with only one hand, and he couldn't react fast enough.  His footing faltered on a mixture of the saline pooling from the broken IV line and his own blood dripping from his own wounds.  And in an instant, the man was above him with the tip of his sword coming at his throat.  He hadn't the time to try and defend himself, he hadn't the time to even breathe.

"What the hell is going on in here!?"

The tip of the sword was stopped with a flash as it reflected the lights from above.  Both men found confusion replacing what should have been a swift death, and they both looked to the door of the room where a group of clinic staff stood in what could only have been utter shock.

"Drop your sword, now!"  A larger man pushed his way through, and Graves could only assume he must have been some form of security for the clinic, or perhaps he was a bouncer from one of the bars that had taken refuge from the Genesis copies outside.  "Now!"

The tension was still thick, but adrenaline quickly dropped, and now both men were starting to feel their wounds a little more clearer.  Mejia suddenly let out a pained grunt as he turned and snatched his bag from the corner of the room.

"Get back here you mother fucker!"  Graves struggled to stand as he watched Mejia shove his way through the group of people, evading their grasps as they tried to stop him.  Graves was able to get to his feet, but several of the larger men were stepping into the room to most likely apprehend him.  Graves didn't want to stay to find out.  "Get the fuck away!"  He tried to run, but the men grabbed him, pinning him in their hold.

A small nurse squeezed her way between them, her hands already glowing with the signs of a healing magic.  "Please, hold still.  The wounds in your arms look deep."

Graves managed to look down to see large gashes that the metal frame created.  His eyes then trailed the room, and it was in complete disarray, covered in debris from the equipment and their blood.  "Lemme go, I gotta go after him!"

"You can't go out there!  There are monsters attacking the town," she said as she started to heal his arms.

"That fuck's worse than any monster!  He needs to be stopped!"

"You're not going anywhere," one of the larger men said.  "We're detaining you until we figure this all out."

Graves struggled, trying to wiggle his shoulders from the men's hands as reality started to set in.  Mejia was escaping, everything that he had worked for and endured was becoming pointless.  He couldn't stop here; he had to keep going.  So he waited until the nurse healed him just enough to close his wounds before he twisted his way from the men, then struck them each in the chest with his elbows.  The nurse scampered back with a cry, and a few of the other staff members in the doorway tried to grab hold of him as he ran past, but he managed to slip through and he scooped up his seabag from outside the room.

He could hear them shouting at him as he bolted through the hallways, and even a few of the staff members tending to the injured people in the front lobby stopped to see what the commotion was, but once Graves burst through the doors and out into the fray in the streets, their shouting was gone.

And now his ears were filled with the screaming and crying of the survivors in the streets, the echo of gunfire towards the docks, and somewhere in the middle of all that, he could hear the crashing of the ocean.  It was surreal to hear the sounds of what was a tranquil paradise now merging with the sounds of chaos around.  

There was too much going on around him as people darted in and out of buildings, the strange humanoids trotting about with their equally strange guns … even his own sense of panic was distracting him, and he struggled to search his surroundings for Mejia.  He lost sight of him, and for all he knew, the man could have easily ducked down an alleyway or into a shop nearby for safety.  But his instinct was leading him towards the front of the town and it had paid off as his eyes spotted a fresh trail of blood on the ground.  It could have been anyone's blood at that point, but he followed it.

Graves stopped running when he heard a shrill scream, and huddled against the wall of a building was an elderly woman and a small boy.  Lurking towards them was a Genesis copy.  The elderly woman was cupping the boy's head in her hands, pressing his face to her bosom as if trying to shield him, as if her will power alone was going to protect them.  Graves never did care much for children, and elderly people did nothing for him but bore him to death, but he couldn't leave them.  

He cursed out loud as he slipped his seabag off his shoulder and removed his assault rifle from the straps on the top.  His thumb flicked the selector lever on the weapon to burst and raised it to aim at the copy.  Why couldn't these people he was about to save be attractive women?  At least then, losing Mejia's trail would have been somewhat worth it for him.  He fired several rounds off into the copy and it lurched back, falling to the ground.

More seemed to be coming from the direction of the beach and the docks.  Some lie in the streets unmoving, others began to collect back to their feet to continue whatever their ultimate goal of attacking the small resort town was.  Graves had never seen these forms of the Genesis copies before, but he had fought others in the past.  But these ones, the numbers seemed to swell quickly, and when one would fall, another would seem to replace it.  The motive of the copies seemed to be unclear, and perhaps it had something to do with members of Shin-Ra being in the town, or maybe a cargo ship from Shin-Ra had docked from Junon.   Perhaps there was no motive.  Random acts of killing, maybe revenge of some sort … but whatever the reason, Graves would never know.

"Seems like everyone has some shit goin' on in this town," Graves muttered to himself as a few more sprays of bullets hit a group of copies that ran up to him.  As they fell, he glanced over to the elderly woman and the boy and saw that they were hesitating, watching for a break in the attacks to flee.  

The streets were now barren of life, littered only with the idle corpses of both humans and humanoids.  The next wave of Genesis copies were making their way over the stone arch at the entrance of the town, so Graves was left wondering why these two were still cowering together, unmoving.  They could easily flee into one of the shops before the copies reached them.

"'Ey!  Get movin'!  The hell you waitin' for!?"  His patience was fully gone now, lost when Mejia's trail disappeared, and he blamed the clinic staff, he blamed himself, and he especially now blamed these two.  And now they just stared at him, petrified, and he wasn't sure if they were scared of the Genesis copies or of him.  But when he hoisted his assault rifle above his shoulder and fired off a few bursts into the air, and they let out screams as a reply, he quite possibly got his answer.  "Get the fuck outta here, now!"  He watched as they spent one more second hesitating, then finally grabbed onto each other and slipped inside the bar.

Graves turned to look back at the copies as they suddenly stopped their trek down the stone steps by the villa and began to head back towards the dock, as if chasing something.  He lowered his weapon with a scoff, glancing around for any more enemies nearby.  

That was when he heard the door to the villa slam and he looked up, seeing a man with a familiar-looking sword at the top of the steps.  It took him a few moments to process who it was, and by the time he realized it was Mejia, the man had already jumped the stone bridge and began sprinting to the exit of the town.

~*~*~
The sound was unmistakable, etched into his mind from his years in Shin-Ra.  Even if he had stopped using the rifles when he graduated to SOLDIER, he was still exposed to the sound from the infantry units on a daily basis from the shooting range on site and out in the field.  So as the rounds went off in town, the gunfire reverberated between the stone buildings, causing the chilling echo to rumble through the quiet tropics.  He could hear the casings hitting the ground with that familiar metallic ping in quick succession, and he could hear someone shouting after a brief moment of ceasefire.

It was enough to send Zack running from the docks back to the heart of the town.  He had fought his way from the beach to where Tseng, Reno and Cissnei were fending off the copies as well as protecting the navel personnel and civilians.  Tseng headlined the attack with his handgun, as Reno and Cissnei alternated tending to the injured and destroying the enemy.  They worked in a silent but impressive team, Tseng only giving out short orders and hand gestures, and the other two responded with such timed precision and teamwork that it looked as if it had all been thoroughly choreographed and rehearsed beforehand.  

It didn't take them long to secure the area, but not after a few copies rushed forward and headed for town.  Zack stopped Tseng from firing rounds into them by holding out his now decimated umbrella, and the man held off, allowing Zack to finish up by taking out his aggression on them.  So he followed them, and that was when he had heard the familiar gunfire of the Shin-Ra issued assault rifle.  Had Shin-Ra sent in reinforcements that quickly?  It had only been a matter of minutes that the town was under attack, so for the army to already assemble …

Something wasn't right.  As he ran towards the town, it donned on him that it was only a single gunman, and not a small platoon.  He knocked down a Genesis copy with a swing of his umbrella to get a better look at the man in the street, and Zack just about choked on his own saliva.

"Graves!"  Zack impaled the last copy with the umbrella and ran down the steps, intercepting the man before he could pass beneath the stone bridge.  The man looked a lot different … much different with a shaved head and face, and dressed casually.  In fact, he wasn't even wearing a shirt.  At first glance, when he got closer, Zack thought that he might have been someone else, but when this man had a sudden look of panic cross his face, he knew.

Graves stopped with a pained grunt, and that was when Zack noticed a bleeding wound in his right leg.  It looked like a blunt object had punctured his thigh, and looked more than painful.

"What the hell are you doing here!?"  Zack held the umbrella to the side, as if to block Graves from escaping around him.  "What the hell happened!?"

"Move aside," he said between thick breaths, almost pants.  "That fuck's runnin' away."

Zack started to lower his arm, his once determined expression softening to shock.  "You mean …?"

"Yeah.  Mejia.  He's here.  Was here."

"You've hunted him down all this way?"

"Pretty much."

Zack found himself shaking his head.  He was trying to form all of the questions in his mind into only a few so he wouldn't lose the chance to at least have some answered by Graves.  "Why did you desert?"  

Graves just ignored him.  "Now move so I can kill 'im."

"No, you're coming with me," Zack said calmly, but firmly.  

"I ain't got time for you."

"Oh, you'll have plenty of time for me, trust me."

Graves swallowed hard, but out of exertion rather than fear as he nodded towards the choice of weapon in Zack's hand.  "You gonna umbrella me to death, bro?"

"Don't think that I can't take you on.  Don't underestimate me, and don't underestimate Mejia."  

"I know it's foolish," Graves said, sounding almost somber.  But after a few moments of quiet thinking, he spoke again with a strong voice.  "This is what I wanna do, so dun fuck with a man's pride."  

"You're fucking with my pride!"  

"Bro, how am I fuckin' with yer pride?  'Cuz I'm goin' against Shin-Ra?"  Graves rolled his shoulders with a wince and then readjusted his grip on his rifle.  Zack couldn't tell if it was a threatening gesture, or if he was truly sore from fighting.  

"No," Zack said, holding the umbrella out even higher, "because you're gonna hurt Cloud!"  

Graves fell silent for a while and just stared at him.  His eyes flickered against Zack's, and it looked as if he was mulling around several explanations for Zack's sudden defensiveness towards Cloud.  "Look, bro, whatever ya have goin' on with Cloud, that's yer business."

Zack was now silent, but still held his ground and his stance.  

"But don't ya understand where I'm comin' from?  This fucker not only hurt Cloud, he hurt Ratcliff in the past, and he fuckin' killed Elici.  Who the fuck knows what else he's done?"

"Yeah, but–"  

Graves cut him off again.  "I got more motive to go after this fuck than you ever will."

"I don't see where you get off telling me not to fuck with your pride, and that my reasons aren't half as good as yours.  We both want this man dead–"

"That's why I'm gonna kill 'im."

"Graves, don't be stupid–"

"So what, yer gonna rat me out?  Yer gonna bring me down and turn me back into Shin-Ra so they can throw my ass in the brig?"

Zack found himself shaking his head with a defeated sigh.  "I'll see if I can get some strings pulled for you."

"You an' I both know Shin-Ra is twisted!  They'll do more than just imprison me for deserting, no matter how much ass you kiss or dick you suck for me!"  He spoke loud, his voice echoing through the streets, and Zack wondered if the Turks could hear that over at the docks.  "Besides," he said, finally speaking at a normal and casual tone.  "I ain't worth the trouble."

"You are to Ratcliff and Cloud," Zack said quickly, afraid that if he said it too slow, it might have less of an impact.

"Takin' me back to Shin-Ra will only get me killed.  That'll hurt 'em more, and you'll be the one to blame."  Graves motioned down to the umbrella, and then to the exit of the town, perhaps a pleading look on his face.  "That's why ya gotta let me walk free, Zack."

Zack stood and just stared intently at him for a while.  The silence between them became thick, and it even seemed as if the ocean had quieted for them.  There were only muffled and distant sounds of the injured and the scared behind the closed doors of the buildings.  It was an eerie moment with eerie sounds, and yet the sun was bright and the breeze was almost … comforting.  It really was unsettling.

Zack lowered the umbrella and stepped to the side.

"Thanks, Zack."  Graves' voice was now humbled, and that alone was eerie in it of itself.  "Besides, I'd rather Cloud hate on me, than hate on us both."

"You realize he's gonna hate us all for this no matter what, right?" Zack said, his once intense gaze now solemn as he looked at Graves.

"Naw," Graves said and gave Zack a hard pat on his shoulder, "dun think he could ever hate a guy like you."

"Yeah," Zack said, flatly.

The man's hand slipped off his shoulder, and he began to walk.  "See ya, bro."

"Graves."

He stopped and turned slowly, his eyebrow lifted.

Zack motioned casually to Graves' bare chest.  He had never seen the man out of uniform, let alone without a shirt.  "Nice tatt."

Graves almost seemed surprised, and his hand went to his chest and ran it along his skin.  His fingers skimmed across a bird on his left pectoral, with spread wings and legs tucked close against its body.  There was minute detailing, but the design was bold and strong, spanning across his broad chest.  His hand then went to his other pectoral where there was a design of a vintage scrollwork bird cage with its door open and its perch empty.  

A small grin was now on Graves' face, and his hand dropped back down to his rifle.  "'Ey, dun look so down."  He began walking again.  "Sometimes birds fly back to their cage."

"Yeah …"  Zack frowned at him.  "Sometimes …"

~*~*~*~*~*~*~
… To be continued in Chapter Thirty-Three: Unspoken Words.