damned_institute | Day 19

It was in complete silence that Zack was moved from the cafeteria to the showers. Usually one would have expected him to be chatting with the nurse despite the fact that she happened to think he was a certain Parker Johnson, but... No, not today.

As he entered the showers, he stripped without having to be told (being in the military had accustomed him to this sort of thing) and paced over to a random shower head. Considering he had first pick, he chose one that happened to be slightly removed from most of the others. Once again, not his usual behavior, but...

Cloud was dead. He felt like he was going to vomit, but he didn't exactly want to--he'd just eaten and he'd like to keep that food in his stomach to keep his strength up. Still, he'd broken them both out of there and dragged Cloud across two continents with the intent of making sure he was safe...

He wondered if this was how it had felt for Cloud, when he'd been shot down, killed right in front of him.

...At least he hadn't had to witness it.

Turning the water on hotter than was probably healthy, Zack began to scrub himself down. Hopefully one of the people he'd contacted - Vincent or Kadaj, since they would have to be male - would find him and he could actually talk to someone about the whole situation. Because internalizing wasn't doing him much good.

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The orderlies that had escorted him strayed only momentarily, their scrutinizing eyes sweeping the room before turning to leave. Vincent sank down in a corner of the small locker area, staring darkly at the wall.

Cid wasn't here yet.

With a shaky breath he buried his face in his arms again, attempting desperately to quell the fury that had followed him to the showers. The numbness from before had been better.

It was ironic. Before Landel's, he'd been doing very well.

Vincent only then realized that his claw was a gold hand again.

Cid didn't show up too long after, however, towel around his middle and tied to the side. As much as he was used to communal showers, he wasn't sure if he liked the idea in the context of fucking orderlies rushing him around as if he'd been wrong in insulting that asshole sadist.

The pilot knew he'd realized the night before that making new allies would be a damn good theory of thought to subscribe to, but seeing Vincent still practically comatose in the showers...

Cid felt something like irrational anger rise up in him, not about Cloud, not about Hojo, hell, not even about Landel's.

He stormed over to Vincent, grabbing him by his fleshy arm and pulling him up so the other man was facing him.

"You think that's gonna do Cloud any good?" Cid growled, blue eyes narrowed. He shoved Vincent back. "All that mopin' and weepin' and blaming yourself for something they fucking did to you?"

The pilot shook his head, bringing up a finger even as he stepped back under the head of one of the active showers.

'Now. Right now, you're gonna clean yourself up, get some fresh clothes on, and then we're gonna talk about a fucking strategy instead of how fucking guilty you are, all right? No point moping unless you're doing somethin' about it."

"I'm clean," Vincent snarled, his eyes murderous and his fist clenched as he stepped back from the heat and steam of the showers. "They washed me because I was covered in lung."

He inhaled slowly, backing against the locker as his angry glare softened into an enervated gaze, and he shrugged heavily.

"Cid," Vincent started, the rancor gone from his voice, "An hour ago I woke up and realized I'd murdered my friend---our friend---and I almost killed everyone else." He paused, this vulnerability unsettling. "Killing people used to be part of my job," he said resignedly. "I'm still good at it, apparently."

That Hojo's words were getting to him was infuriating.

"Yeah, well," Cid growled, taking a step back from the shower to grab Vincent's arm and pull him back towards the water, "you obviously don't feel clean, so why don't you scrub your damn self down until you can talk without blaming yourself for something that wasn't your fucking fault?"

Cid might have shared his own thoughts on who was the truly culpable party would it not have made him a hypocrite.

He squirted some shampoo out of the nearby dispenser that was attached to the wall, running it and scrubbing it through his hair as he pointedly ignored whatever mopey response Vincent might decide to throw at him.

The pilot was still swimming in the grief, using rationality as the life raft it was. He'd be a robot if he wasn't.

That didn't mean, however, that he'd let his friend fucking sink in it.

As Zack was heading back toward the locker room, he found it difficult to not catch the conversation between two men. Not a conversation as much as an argument, but the point was that he'd managed to find Vincent.

Frowning (because this was going to be more than a little awkward), he padded, barefoot, over to the duo.

He hung back, away from them a bit but still making it rather obvious that he was trying to enter the discussion. He considered waiting until he was noticed, but Zack knew that being meek got you nowhere.

Sighing and clearing his throat, he focused on Vincent, figuring he'd determine who the other man was afterward. He didn't seem hostile in the way that it was worrisome--no, Zack could tell he was a friend that was trying to help in the only way he knew how.

"Hey," he said, raising his voice loud enough that it would be heard over the sound of running water. "Vincent, right?" He tried not to look as exhausted and horrible as he felt, if only because the man probably didn't need to see how other people were suffering from what he'd done, whether or not he'd meant to. He seemed to be drowning in enough guilt as it was.

Metal fingers pried Cid's hand from his arm with relative ease, and Vincent opened his mouth to retaliate when a voice from nearby called his name. He backed out of reach to face who was probably Zack.

Zack... The man Cloud had emulated for so long. He'd died, destroyed by Shinra itself after years of Hojo-induced experiments, and his friend---ex-friend---had gone on for nearly a year with everything but his name. Seeing the kid now, naked with sopping wet hair and no older than twenty-five, Vincent was shaken from his withdrawn detachedness and could only stare a long moment before finally nodding in acknowledgement.

"Zack?" he asked hesitatingly, though he was already painfully certain. He even walked as Cloud had ~~(and never would again)~~.

"Uh?" Cid turned his head as he ran his hands through his hair to rid it of the last of the shampoo. There was a new guy standing there--someone who was talking to Vincent but who he couldn't quite hear with all the water rushing around him.

He closed his eyes, finishing washing all the crud that had accumulated in the nooks and crannies of his skin these past couple of days. It was good that Vincent was talking to someone, he figured, so he'd let him do his thing for the moment and then rudely interrupt a few seconds later.

Cid was just that kind of guy.

He grabbed his towel, stepping out of the water's spray and beginning to dry himself off as well as listen in to the conversation.

Zack was thankful that the other man was staying out of things for the moment. He wasn't sure how much time they were allotted in the showers--and he had been there for a good while already.

However, now that he'd found Vincent, he wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to say. The whole situation was touchy and he didn't want to rub the man the wrong way. He certainly didn't want to accuse Vincent of doing anything he hadn't, but questioning him about what had happened the night before hadn't seemed to work so well before.

He sighed and ran a hand through his wet hair. "How did you know Cloud? Sorry, it's just... He never mentioned you. I've heard that people are taken from different times...?" That was still hard for him to wrap his head around. "Did you meet him after...?" That wasn't going to make sense. Vincent wouldn't have any way of knowing at what period of Cloud's life he had known him...

"Sorry. I'm a little disoriented right now."

"About six months after you died," he said without hesitation. It occurred to him that Zack most likely had no idea of his fate, but subtlety was lost on Vincent today. Even so, He found me in a dusty coffin, wasn't exactly the conversation starter the ex-Turk wanted to use right now, so with no further explanation he simply shrugged.

"What do you want to know?"

But before Cid could even fully dry himself, the nurses were approaching. It would have to wait until lunch.

Day 19 - Male Showers

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