CHAPTER 13

"I want a FULL report on ANYTHING that you can conceive that could be the reason for this!"

Jessie's eyes were wide with shock and fear as Dyne yelled this out at her. No sooner that she could bring herself to respond than the one-armed man twirled around to face Biggs...

"I want EVERY bit of info you can muster! How much notice did Shinra have? Who SPECIFICALLY knew? I want you to contact our man, I don't care about risking exposing him, I want ANSWERS!"

Biggs stood even more upright than he had been as a bead of sweat formed on his brow, showing his nervousness. He hesitantly nodded as Dyne spun on one heel and practically tore through the secret doorway that lead back into Seventh Heaven.

Jessie let out a slight sigh of relief as she plopped down into her chair at her computer terminal. She proceeded to rub her temples and breath a bit more heavily out of nervousness. Biggs came up to her slowly, and looked back behind himself to make sure Dyne was gone before he spoke.

"Wow... that, this... ooh boy, we're in trouble."

"He's just... he's just mad," Jessie responded, "I mean, we all but destroyed Sector One... or at least, that's what it looks like. I KNOW it wasn't our bomb, Dyne didn't even touch the detonator. Of course, something ELSE could have set the bomb off, but that would mean someone found out our detonator's frequency..."

"And that would be my department to make sure that stuff doesn't happen... or at least find out if it does..." Biggs said slowly.

"Besides, our bomb wasn't designed to do that! It was just meant to disrupt the reactor, not cause a thermo-makular explosion," the brown haired girl explained.

"Yeah, well, in any case, I gotta get in touch with you-don't-know-who..." Biggs said with a shrug, "Good luck on your end!"

"Yeah, see ya," Jessie replied softly. She rubbed her eyes, and proceeded to crack her knuckles, staring at the screen with heightened determination. With a few clicks, she brought up a screen which showed the design specks for the bomb she had helped design, and pulled up information on where they had gotten the parts and instructions. She wasn't sure quite what she was looking for, but she had to start somewhere.

Biggs activated a terminal on the other side of the room, but did not bother to sit. He simply logged on as [HocheyHoney_069] and sent an instant message to a [Wh0_Y0_D4ddy], saying "19/f, want to get under my covers? ;)". He quickly logged off and hoped that the intended recipient would receive the message. The espionage agent then made his way out of the Seventh Heaven bar and hopped down the wooden steps. He walked down the dirt road a ways, weaving in between buildings and down narrow alleys. He constantly checked to see if he was being followed, and often double-backed just to throw anyone who might have been following him off. Only he and Dyne knew who their man on the inside was, and how to contact him. Biggs had to make sure it was kept that way.

He eventually came to a small pillar which served as a secondary support for the plate above, though Dyne had found a much better use for it. Biggs was about to open a hidden access panel when...

"Yo Biggs, wassap?"

Biggs's brown eyes widened with surprise as he spun around in response to the voice.

"Damn it, Zack! What are you doing here... no, scratch that, HOW did you get here?!" Biggs yelled with annoyance at the former SOLDIER.

Zack shrugged and stood in a cock-sure pose while giving Biggs an innocent look. "I just followed you. I wanted to know why you were running around in the shadows and stuff."

"B-but HOW?! No one's been able to follow me so far!" Biggs whined.

"Maybe no one cared to," Zack replied with a shrug.

Biggs thought this over for a moment, and finally decided that he had work to do. "Can you just, leave me alone? I gotta do my espionage stuff..."

"Sure." Zack turned around and started walking off, leaving Biggs to do his thing. Once he was sure he was alone, Biggs opened up the access hatch and pulled out...

..A metal can connected to a copper wire. Granted, it was no where near the most advanced telecommunications device, but it was impossible to tap or trace. Biggs put the can to his mouth and spoke. "You there?" He put the can to his ear, awaiting a response.

"Yes," came a familiar voice.

"I need some info... How much notice did Shinra have on our plan?"

"I don't know. Obviously a lot more than I thought if they managed to evacuate Sector One before it all went down..."

"What?!" Biggs responded in surprise.

"I think that fax that got sent to us was just a reminder. They knew about this for a while, they had to've. There's no way they could've planned to evacuate that fast on such short notice."

"We need to know how they knew, and when they got to know it," Biggs informed the other person.

"I'll see what I can do. My position allows me access to our own intelligence database... but people'll be suspicious if... uh-oh..."

"Uh-oh, what?"

"Someone's coming, later!"

Biggs looked at the can for a moment, almost expecting an answer to his question, but none came.

Zack walked along the dirt road with his hands in his pockets, casually strolling along, taking in the broken down buildings around him. He couldn't help but glance up at the gargantuan plate above his head a few times... it seemed intimidating, to say the least. He eventually made his way over to a cross-section area. Looking around, he saw the gate to sector 6 to his right, in front of him was the path to the train station, and off to his left...

The lone former SOLDIER let out a low whistle and wandered slowly over to it. It was huge; a giant pillar of marble, flanked by a large column of metal stairs that went almost all the way to the top. Opaque green fog lay still at its base, and filtered out only after a few dozen yards up.

"It's the support pillar," came a voice behind the unaware ex-SOLDIER.

Zack did his best to contain his surprise, and turned around calmly. He saw a man, a bit older than himself, about 28 Zack estimated. He had dark skin and was wearing a very ugly orange shirt with black cargo pants.

"This is my special place," the man explained, waving out with his arm. "Well, not MINE mine, but you know, I just come here to relax."

"How can you relax with that big plate over your head?" Zack asked humorously.

"Well, it is a bit disturbing, but since I know that it's this giant pillar which keeps that plate up there, it makes me feel safe. Of course, if anything ever happened to that pillar... well... heh, it's best not to dwell on such things. It'd never happen anyway!"

With that, Zack felt something. A wave of fatigue and nausea suddenly swept through him, and he took a heavy breath in response. He started feeling dizzy and tried to hold himself up.. but everything started going dark. Zack fought to remain conscious, but all he could see was the plate breaking apart, falling straight for him! The large omnipresent structure got closer and closer AND CLOSER as screaming prevailed in his head as hearing was the only sense left to him...

"HEY, SNAP OUT OF IT!"

Zack blinked. The man was standing in front of him, bracing him by the shoulders with his hands. Zack took another deep breath as his senses returned to normal. He closed his eyes tightly and shook his head.

"You okay?" the man asked.

"Y-yeah... I'm fine... I think..." Zack responded, completely unsure if he was, in fact, fine. The young man simply held his head as he wandered back into Sector Seven. He needed a drink.

On the way, he ran into Wedge. "Hey chub-akka!"

Wedge struggled for a response, but nothing came to him for a while. Suddenly, he perked up, "Oh, hey, uhhhhm, morning-star-head!"

The black haired man just looked up at his thick, spiky mane. He shrugged, "That's okay, I guess. Keep trying, man!"

Wedge nodded and walked off, while Zack continued towards the neon-sign decorated bar at the end of the street.

Zack cautiously entered the Seventh Heaven bar, the wooden planks of the floor starting to moan and creak from its old age. Tifa was behind the bar, mixing up some kind of drink, but for who Zack could not determine, as there was no one else around. Tifa turned her head slightly until Zack was just within her vision.

"You need something?" she asked with mild disinterest.

Zack was about to give the buxom ninja a cold look, but decided against it. He simply sat at the nearest stool. "Yeah, I'll take a beer and... oh yeah, while your at it, how about a reason why you've been such a hard case?"

Tifa finished the drink she was making and poured it with care into a glass. "The first will cost you five gil. The second we don't serve here." And with that, she took the drink into the back room. Zack sat there dumbfounded as he heard Tifa open a door, take a few steps into a room, then re-emerge a few moments later.

"You know, that's not very nice," Zack commented.

"Zack, I don't have to explain anything to you," Tifa replied while placing her mixing cups into a dishwasher.

"No, I mean, five gil for a beer? And I'm in AVALANCHE for chrissake! Don't I get a discount?"

Tifa gave Zack a sharp, angry stare. It subsided after a moment, however. "Zack, you're not IN AVALANCHE until Dyne and I say you are. For right now, you're just visiting. Am I clear?"

Zack narrowed his eyes and leaned forward. "Has anyone ever told you how cute you are when you're being a bitch?"

Tifa opened her mouth to respond to give Zack a piece of her mind, but she was cut off.

"No? Good, cuz you're really not," Zack pointed out.

With that, Tifa grabbed Zack's collar and yanked him halfway over the counter, and raised her other fist to strike. She wanted to yell something back, but couldn't think of anything, her mind clouded with anger. She finally calmed down enough to release Zack (though a bit roughly). The younger woman breathed deeply, slowly, and methodically to calm herself down. She recalled all the things about self-control that had been taught to her by her former sensei, Zangan.

Zangan... Tifa wondered to herself. Why did you have to die?

Zack noticed Tifa's sudden change of mood, from anger to sadness. She had turned around and bowed her head, and seemed to be trying to stop herself from crying.

"Tifa...?" Zack tried.

"I'm..." Tifa started, but then stopped short. She let out a sigh and shook her head until she came back to her senses.

"No, wait," Zack said, interrupting her yet again. "I'm sorry. I know I did something to cheese you off. I... you said something about me leaving you to die before. I never meant to do that, really. It's just... there was nothing I could do."

"Zack, not everything's about you," Tifa offered as something resembling an apology.

"Hmm?"

"You may have heard... Zangan, he... he died a few months ago and I... He's been like a Father to me these past five years, more of a father than... I.. I feel bad for even thinking it, but..."

"Shhh..." Zack tried before Tifa became an emotional waterfall. "Okay...it's okay. I'm sorry about Zangan, he seemed like a great guy..."

"The best," Tifa murmured.

"...And if it's any consolation," Zack continued, "I can say out loud and with a bit of pride that I hate my parents! So really, it's nothing to be ashamed of if you wanna say you think your dad was less than perfect..."

Tifa's eyes went wide at this revelation and she turned to face Zack directly. "You... what? What did you say?"

"I. Hate. My. Parents. I mean, they ain't all THAT bad I supposed, and I'd miss them if they were gone forever -I can only wait and wish until THAT happens- but for the time being, I can justify saying that I really don't like them all that much."

Tifa was about to ask Zack to go into more detail (after all, he seemed like he was one of those "ideal childhood" type of kids and this came as a huge shock to her), but then the door suddenly burst open.

Dyne strode in, looking directly at Zack. The older AVALANCHE leader walked slowly up to Zack and sat next to him, not taking his eyes off Zack's the whole time.

"Dyne," Zack acknowledged the one-armed man. Dyne just continued staring at the young ex-SOLDIER.

"What's with you and staring at me?" Zack asked. "I mean, if it's an intimidation thing, it's not working," he pointed out.

Dyne groaned and shook his head. Then, without warning or provocation, he pointed the long, thin barrel of his gun-arm right between Zack's eyes!

"Tell me what you're thinking, right now, don't hesitate, just spit it out," Dyne said in a somewhat commandant tone.

Without missing a beat, Zack responded, "You REALLY need to clean the inside of that thing..."

"Doesn't anything scare you?" Dyne tried.

"The thought of Wedge naked," Zack answered.

Dyne took a moment to blink. "Zack, tell me something."

"Shoot... uh, but not literally!"

"Did you have anything to do with the bomb malfunctioning? Did you tell Shinra?"

'No and no! And by the way, you might wanna work on your interrogation skills..."

"Very well," Dyne said, standing up. "Follow me. If you can't give me a straight answer without joking around, you leave me no other recourse."

Zack slid off his stool and looked back to Tifa. "What's he up to?" he whispered to her.

Tifa shrugged as a response. Zack casually put his hands in his pockets and followed Dyne out. Tifa narrowed her eyes in suspicion... something wasn't right with the AVALANCHE leader. She quickly hopped out from behind the bar and followed the two men. Dyne led Zack up through beginners hall, and to the top floor, where Cloud lay. Dox was just beside him.

"Ah, Dyne! And... Zack, right? I'm glad you're here, I have an update on..."

Dyne ignored Dox and practically shoved him aside to stand next to Cloud. Zack's eyes widened as he saw Dyne place an armor-piercing shell inside his gun-arm and point it right at the comatose young man's forehead.

"Dyne, what are you..." the lanky medical man tried to ask, but was cut off.

"Shut up, Dox!" Dyne snapped. He then spoke to Zack. "Okay, now, tell me the truth this time. Are you a spy? A saboteur? If you value your friend's life, you'll tell me EVERYTHING I need to know!"

"More like what you want to hear!" Zack spat, beginning to panic. "Now take that gun away from Cloud's head, or-."

"Or what? In the time it would take you to grab your sword, Cloud'll be dead. Granted, then nothing would stop you from killing me, but is it worth the cost? Now, tell me or I'll shoot..." As Dyne spoke this, the metal of the gun arm glistened menacingly, almost as if it were eager to spill blood. Zack's heart began to beat loudly and slowly, and time almost seemed to drag as his mind raced for something to say that would get Dyne to at least take the gun away from Cloud's head...

"DYNE!"

The older man's head snapped at Tifa's voice. But before he could respond, a quick, shadowy form leapt over Zack's shoulder and went straight for the AVALANCHE leader, and pinned him to the wall! Tifa's right hand struggled to keep the gun arm pointed away, while her left hand kept Dyne's face turned sideways against the concrete wall.

"Dyne! Have you gone nuts?! What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Tifa spat.

"People, please, this is a triage unit! This is no place for violence!" Dox interjected, but he would not be heard.

"Sooo...." Dyne hissed, a wild look in his eye, "YOU'RE the traitor, Tifa! I shoulda known! Who else but the only person I trust, of course! This attack is all the proof I need of your treachery!" Dyne struggled to release his gun-arm from Tifa's grasp, and managed to yank it free! But before he could aim it...

-SLAKANT!-

Zack had unsheathed his Buster Sword, and sliced the irate man's weapon right down the middle!

"Dammit, Zack! You ARE in on this! Everyone's against me! Damn Shinra dogs, you WILL NOT HAVE ME!" Dyne burst out, pushing his way past the two. He produced a grenade from a pocket in his vest, "I'LL TAKE YOU ALL WITH M-"

And with that, Dyne slowly began to pass out. Dox was right behind him, pinching a point near his neck.  The inactivate grenade dropped harmlessly to the floor as Dyne slumped into Dox's arms.

"What the hell's wrong with him?" Zack wondered aloud.

"He gets like this sometimes, especially after a failure," Dox explained, "All his rage and hate for the Shinra, all his pent up negative emotions are stored up and come out in bursts. He's never threatened anyone before, though. He's under a lot of stress. I'd like to say he didn't mean all of this, and he'll most likely apologize to no end after he's had a good nap and time to think, but still, I think that if not for Tifa, we'd of ended up with quite a mess in here."

"So he is a nutcase," Zack joked. Both Tifa and Dox shot him an angry glance. Zack simply shrugged and looked at them innocently, then much more quietly muttered, "Well, he is..."

"Well, I have two patients to look after now..." the doctor said almost complainingly, "So if you two don't mind, help me get Dyne into a bed and please be off," the older man requested. Tifa and Zack both nodded and carried Dyne over to another bed on the other side of the room, and went out through the exit. When they were outside, they walked side by side (somewhat on accident, really) back towards the bar.

Tifa began rubbing her temples with her finger tips, and made her way to rubbing her eyes. Zack noticed this. "Something wrong?"

"No it's just... A lot of stress, y'know. I'm not sure if I need a nap or if I need to hit something..."

"Well, if you're so inclined, we COULD have that, ah, re-match..." Zack teased with a slight grin, holding his hands behind his head.

Tifa looked up at the young warrior while keeping her head low, belaying her suspicion. Her short, chocolate hair wavered in front of her eyes, slightly masking her expression from Zack. Though after a moment of thought, she lowered her eyes a bit, put a slight smile on her face and brushed back her hair behind her ear with her hand. "That reminds me. Thank you."

"What for?" Zack asked somewhat rhetorically.

"For lying about... that night. I appreciate it."

"No prob... I didn't want to embarrass you in front of your friends, teammates, etc, and I wasn't even going to mention it, but I ran right into that part and couldn't avoid it, so I just fibbed the rest."

"Yes, I know, I was there..." Tifa explained. She seemed to be lightening up, and Zack almost thought he saw her blushing. They had made it to the steps of the bar, and Zack turned on his heel to leave.

"I better go... I don't wanna risk saying something dumb now that I've finally gotten you in a good mood," the raven haired man quipped.

"N-no, wait..." Tifa insisted, putting a hand on Zack's nearest arm. "How about that drink first?"

"For five bucks, no way!"

"... This one's on the house."

"Sign me up!"

The two made their way into the bar, hopefully to rekindle a small part of their lost friendship. But the forces that be have made sure that this would not be a task so easily accomplished...

"By the way," Tifa asked, "...what happened to the corner table?"

"I, uh, kinda tripped on it and broke the leg off..."

"YOU DID WHAT?! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW HARD I WORK TO KEEP THIS PLACE LOOKING NICE?!? *#%$(@&*#$@#*!!!!"

...Not so easy, indeed!

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