This is...well, I'm not really sure. The first thousand words or so came out of nowhere, and I've picked and poked at it for months since, until finishing it within an hour of finishing Threepart Harmony last week. I've been told that the way the Turks behave in this piece, both with each other and with Rufus, is creepy, but it seems very like them to me. Very pack-animal in nature, but very in character for them.

The story begins before FFVII:AC, and continues through it and into the other side. Do keep that in mind as you read, as a few things will make a lot more sense that way.

Don't expect too much from me the rest of the month and part of next month; my wisdom teeth are coming out on Monday, and I'm moving into my new apartment at the beginning of August, which involves an 8 hour drive and getting my stuff up to the second floor. School starts on the 18th of August (I'm a SENIOR!). I'm still writing, y'all, just slowly.

A scream roused all four Turks in a private building at the Healin Lodge early on a warm summer morning. They all ran for the suite of rooms the scream had come from, not pausing to do more than grab weapons on the way.

Tseng- wearing tight exercise pants and brandishing a short sword in the hand not holding his gun- kicked the door open, catching it with his elbow when it hit the wall and rebounded towards him. "Sir?" he called.

"I-I'm in here, Tseng." Rufus voice was shaking, and his Turks wasted no time in booking it into the bedroom.

They found their employer sitting on the edge of the bed in his pajamas, one hand held away from himself as though there was something foul on it.

"What happened, yo?" Reno scrubbed at his eyes with his free hand. He was naked, though no one in the room had really noticed. Living so close together had made them all tolerant to things like nudity. "You okay?"

"Look," Rufus whispered. He extended his hand towards his Turks, and they leaned in to see what he was showing them. Then, as one, they recoiled, startled by the sight of the ugly blackish mottling that marred the fair skin.

" Geostigma," Rude said softly. He holstered his gun, shoulders slumping. Having been on duty, he was the only one of them fully dressed, sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

Elena whimpered. She hesitated, then scrambled onto the bed and hugged Rufus tightly. He put his clean arm around her, long, elegant fingers splayed over the slick baby blue fabric of her pajama top. Reno followed, leaving the Tseng and Rude to feel slightly awkward and move closer to the bed.

"I'll…manage," Rufus said slowly. "One more medical problem on top of all the others is nothing to fuss over." His voice was shaking, fearful and strained. "Everything will be fine."

"Of course, sir."

+/-

Everything was not fine. The disease robbed Rufus of the strength he had been regaining. The slow, careful steps he'd taken across the lodge every day became more and more painful until the day he collapsed and couldn't summon the strength to get back up again. Rude gently settled him back in his wheelchair, and once he had shut himself back in his bedroom, he cried bitterly for all the progress that now meant nothing.

Fever came and went, reducing him to a shivering, sweating wreck of humanity for a few hours, then vanishing, leaving him to try and recover himself before the next spike. It took far too much energy to support his body in such a state, and he began to lose weight, first the softness at his thighs and waist, remnants of long weeks before he had begun physical therapy, then other, less easily spared weight, thinning his limbs and his face. He ate more when he could, and said nothing every time he had to tighten his belt another notch.

+/-

As one, his Turks adapted to care for him. They learned what medicines he needed to lessen the pain, how much he could take at a time and what he could not have or do after taking them. They figured out what best broke up and cleaned away the black slime that leaked from the marks on Rufus' skin, how to help him bathe without completely losing his dignity, and what foods appealed to him and his delicate stomach.

They kept doing what they had always done, with few changes beyond the obvious. They took to accompanying Rufus out of the lodge in pairs, one of them to catch Rufus, should he fall out of his chair, and the other to catch the chair before it had a chance to roll or fall into him. Reno, Tseng, and Elena kept visiting him at night for twenty minutes of gasping and sighs, but Rude stopped- as big and heavy as he was, he could do Rufus some serious damage if he wasn't careful. This took him off shower duty as well, since it wasn't fair to make him handle what he couldn't have anymore.

+/-

Rufus tried as hard as he could. From his bed in the lodge, he spent hours coordinating with Reeve and keeping the remains of his company in order, slowly rebuilding a power base. Tidied up and sitting in an armchair bought specifically for the purpose, he held videoconferences with men half a world away, negotiating, threatening, and demanding in equal measure, keeping them from finding out about just how far Rufus Shinra really had fallen. Not a one was ever invited to come speak to him in person.

"You can go, if you want," he said quietly over dinner one evening. He had begun taking meals with his Turks months ago, before the Stigma had come, and he continued to do so whenever he was able. Dinner around the dining room table was a ritual in which they all partook, a game in which they played that everything was alright.

"I beg your pardon?" It didn't matter who had spoken. The confusion in the voice was the same as the confusion on all four faces.

"All of you. You can leave, if you want to." Rufus looked down at his plate, poking at the pasta he had been picking at. "I will understand completely if you do. This is not what you signed up for."

"We signed up to serve you and the company," someone said, voice soft.

"You didn't sign up expecting to have to bathe and dress your invalid of an employer," Rufus spat, throwing his fork down. He didn't have the strength to throw it hard, but the sharp clink of metal on china was still loud in the suddenly quiet room. "You never asked to be locked away in a private lodge, caring for a man who will die and leave you jobless."

"We wouldn't stay if we didn't want to be here."

"But-"

"We will be here until your death."

"Until our contracts are void."

"Until you no longer had any need of our services."

"And then we will leave."

"And we will never return."

"But not until this is over."

Rufus swallowed. It was rare these days that his Turks displayed the creepy pack dynamic they had developed, but when they did, it never failed to send chills running down his spine. It was as though they could reach each other's thoughts, knowing what to say or do before anyone else knew they were saying or doing anything at all.

"I…I understand," he murmured, feeling thoroughly chastened and rather small. "Thank you."

"Just doing our job, sir."

+/-

It was January when Tseng collapsed on a routine walk around the lodge's perimeter. When he had been hauled back inside by Rude, he was summarily stripped and examined by all three members of his team. Rufus was asleep, allowing even Reno- who was on guard duty- to be there.

His back was a solid mess of mottled black, smeared under the bandages Tseng wore with a compression shirt to keep them flat. The thick slime obscured the massive Leviathan tattooed on his back, turned the beautiful golden skin to muddy grey, and told a story his teammates demanded details of at once.

He had been suffering quietly for a month and a half. Rufus didn't question when Tseng kept a shirt on while they fucked. Neither did any of the others; partially clothed sex was a kink he indulged in freely, no more unusual for him than biting and scratching for Reno, or being slowly choked for Rude. His body temperature had always been high, so no one had questioned the cotton-wrapped gel packs in the freezer, which he took out to drape around his neck, cooling the fevers no one had known about. There was no weight loss yet, the disease too busy slowly nibbling at powerful muscle and a strong body that offered far more resistance than Rufus' weakened one.

The Turks were furious. As one they scolded Tseng, never once raising their voices for fear of waking Rufus and alerting him to the problem, but there was no need to. Every word they spoke was laced with fury and disappointment that Tseng had not trusted them with this terrible secret, had not believed they could handle the knowledge that he, like their employer, was dying by inches, being eaten away by a scourge no doctor could cure.

When they emerged from the bedroom, it was impossible to tell that there had been any argument at all.

+/-

In the months that followed, Rude and Elena both found patches of grayish-black slime on their skin; Elena on her biceps, Rude up the length of one massive thigh. As a unit they wrapped and cleaned and treated, and if Rufus noticed that the meals they prepared were getting increasingly healthy, he said nothing.

Only Reno seemed immune, busily going through life like their own personal firecracker, filling the silences with music and weird noises from video games and cursing when he burnt his fingers while cooking up any one of a number of ethnic dishes no other Turk could replicate no matter how they tried. He smiled while he wiped away slime, joked as he tightly wrapped bandages and then slid compression sleeves over them, chattered away while one of his partners lay with their head in his lap, shivering under the onslaught of another fever. He was, as he had always been, a deceptively happy pillar of semi-sanity in the midst of the mess that was crashing down on them.

Elena believed that Reno was immune because he had normal blood alcohol content equivalent to that of a plum that had been soaked in a casket of wine for a few months, and that the disease couldn't grow in that kind of environment. Rude pointed out that Reno had a considerable amount of Mako in his body, which might be better at fighting it off or might even make him properly immune to it. Tseng casually mentioned Reno's drug use, and how all the nice healthy little body parts that the disease might want to feed upon were already so full of chemicals and nasty toxins that it was quite likely Reno had already had the disease and had killed it by way of being completely inedible. The theories made everyone laugh, but it was hollow laughter, without the joy behind it that should have been there. They all knew that when it came down to it, Reno would be the one standing over the graves.

+/-

In August, Reno came down with a nasty case of stomach flu. He locked himself in the tiny guest suite and turned away all visitors, not wanting to get his teammates, or worse, Rufus, sick, coming out only to fetch the trays of plain rice, applesauce, beef broth, peppermints, and coconut water doctored with salt, sugar, and lemon juice. He was ill for a week.

On the eighth day, Tseng received a text message from Reno, asking him to come to the guest suite. Tseng did not tell Elena or Rude, and waited until they had taken Rufus on his afternoon roll to visit.

The Reno who answered Tseng's quiet knock was a Reno who looked his thirty years, silent and pale and thin, mouth drawn into a tight line. He let Tseng in and locked the door again, then pointed wordlessly at the bucket on the floor beside his bed.

Tseng looked. His face fell. There in the bucket, mixed in with the thin fluid that was all Reno could bring up after a week of illness and soft foods, were ropes of viscous black slime, like the web of some spidery creature infesting Reno's gut. Tseng didn't have to ask. He knew.

One in every five or six hundred cases of Geostigma affected the internal organs. The disease seemed to prefer to present outside the body, eating away at the skin and the bone beneath for a debilitatingly long time before moving to other parts. Internal Geostigma was rare, and exceedingly dangerous, as there was nothing it could feed on that would not cause serious problems fairly rapidly. It was a death sentence, death in a slow, terribly nasty fashion. Had it not been for the stomach virus, Reno could have carried it for months without knowing, and would not have known until something drastic happened, like his kidneys shutting down or one of his lungs collapsing.

Tseng was silent for a long moment, then turned and hugged Reno hard, clasping the bony body tightly against his. Reno shuddered, then hugged him right back, long hands pressed against the thick bandages wrapped around and around him. They stood together for a few reverent minutes, then parted. Tseng kissed Reno's forehead, found him still warm with fever, and tucked him back into bed.

The other Turks knew the moment they had a free second in which to speak with Tseng.

There was nothing that could be done for Reno's Geostigma. No bandages could absorb the slime that oozed into his stomach and slicked up his lungs. No hiding, certainly, except for when the fevers took him and he sweated and shook just like they did. When the fits of pain struck him, however, he did not hide. There was no thick black discharge to splatter on the floor, no telltale signs of the stigma that had infested his body; they told Rufus that he had an ulcer, which explained away the pain, the sweat, the sudden rush for a bathroom when too much slime built up in his stomach or his intestines. Concerned, Rufus focused on him, allowing his other three Turks to keep on working and hiding their own disease.

+/-

When spring rolled around again, things were looking grim. Rufus couldn't even stand unassisted, and the stigma had spread up his arms to his shoulders, an ugly blight on his once beautiful body. Tseng couldn't bend even the slightest without pain, and he worried that he might soon lose the ability to carry out his duties. Elena's hands shook when she lifted anything heavier than a full pot of coffee, arms weakened almost to uselessness. Rude limped, and told Rufus that he had sprained his ankle to hide it, though the problem was not his ankle but the pock marks the disease was eating into his thigh. And then there was Reno, losing weight fast, still smiling and laughing and trying to make light of everything, but crying in his sleep at night.

In a last ditch effort, Rufus organized the foray into the Northern Crater, hoping to find something that might cure him and so many others.

+/-

Afterwards, short two Turks and shaken by the defeat, Reno and Rude and Rufus sat together in the chopper on the helipad at Healin, silent and hurt. It was a long time before Rude and Reno got up, helped Rufus back into his chair from the seat he'd been strapped to, and wheeled him back to the lodge.

"Let me see your ankle, Rude," Rufus said quietly, hours later. He was sipping slowly at a cup of tea, watching Reno cook and Rude limp around, trying to help. "It seems to be getting worse. You must have done something to it this morning."

"It's fine," Rude grunted.

"That's an order, Rude. Get your shoe and sock off and let me see."

Reno and Rude shared a look. Reno nodded faintly. Rude sighed and sat down, wrestling his shoe off and propping his foot up on an empty chair for Rufus to inspect.

"There's…your ankle looks fine." Rufus prodded the dark skin for a moment, then looked up, eyes hard and dark. "Taking your pants off."

"But-"

"Just do it, Rude."

Teeth gritted, Rude stood and unbuckled his belt, then slipped his slacks off, revealing the pad of bandages under a sleek black compression sleeve.

"Take that off," Rufus snapped.

Rude did as he was told without question, removing the sleeve and unwinding layers of bandage until the white material turned to pale grey, then to dark grey, and to black where it was completely soaked through. Finally, it came off completely, revealing the slimy blackened mess and the pockmarks showing faintly reddish, a field of devastation that stretched from his knee to vanish under the hem of his boxers.

"How long have you had this?"

"About a year."

"You've been hiding it from me." It was a statement rather than a question, heavy with disappointment. "Who else?"

"Tseng and Elena."

"Her arms," Rufus whispered. "And his back."

"Yessir."

"And you've all been hiding it from me." He looked at the ruin of Rude's leg again, expression unreadable. "And I've missed it this whole time."

"You didn't need the extra stress."

"Bullshit! I need to know when my Turks are off their feed. I need to know when something's bothering them. I need to know when they're dying!" His voice broke, cracking on that final word, and he began to cry. "Dammit, Rude, you four are all I have left."

Reno and Rude both knelt beside the wheelchair, each laying a hand in Rufus' lap. He covered theirs with his own, bone-thin fingers closing around their fingers and covering the heavy rings with the Turk insignia that they both wore. They remained there until Rufus's breathing evened out once more, then stood up without being told to. Reno hurried to keep dinner from burning. Rude redressed. They ate their meal in silence.

When dishes had been washed and put away, Reno prepared to get Rufus into his evening bath. He had everything ready, towels and soaps and fresh bandages, when Rufus stopped him, catching him by one shirttail.

"Not tonight," he whispered.

"Huh?"

"Get Rude."

"But-"

"Just do it, please."

Reno went and fetched Rude, and the two of them stood at attention before the wheelchair.

"I want to be the middle of a Turk sandwich tonight," Rufus announced. "And I don't want to hear either of you trying to talk me out of it."

"But-" Reno began.

"I can't-" Rude tried.

"Both of you, shut up. I don't want to hear another word out of you unless it's 'fuck me harder'. Is that clear?" Both men nodded. "Good. Rude, I'm going to take my time getting to bed, and when I get there, you had better be naked. Reno, join him. I have something I need to do first."

Rufus revised his will while Reno and Rude stripped and lay on the bed, quietly touching each other while they waited. Then he rolled into the bedroom, locked the door, and insisted on undressing and crawling into the bed on his own.

It certainly wasn't the best sex they'd ever had, but the sleep that came after was the most restful any of them had had in awhile.

+/-

Sheer bullheadedness was all that kept Rufus from crying again when he landed, rather unexpectedly, in the nets anchored by piton darts from guns he knew Reno and Rude didn't carry. Seeing Tseng and Elena on the ground beneath him inspired him to crawl out of the nets on his own, powered mostly by adrenaline, and lean heavily on Tseng while Reno fetched the chair from the top of the building and Elena fussed over him.

He felt…more like himself when he was back in the chair, facing the half-circle of his Turks. They all looked like shit, pale and gaunt and sweaty, beaten and bloody, two of them bandaged and two of them needing bandages. He saw the signs of Geostigma in three of them, and the effects of stress on the fourth, but still, it was like old times.

And then it rained.

And it hurt. It burned like he had dipped his hands in acid, the Holy rain eating away at the blight that had been wearing away at him for so long. He gritted his teeth and started at the burning green until it lifted away, and only then did he look up and see the green sparks floating away from Rude and Elena and Tseng. He missed the look Reno shared with the others, too happy that now he could strike out once more on the road to recovery, and he would walk again if it killed him, dammit.

They all got very drunk that night. There might have been some wild celebratory sex. No one could quite remember except Reno, who pretended not to know out of habit, since getting him drunk took too much effort for a one-night party when he had to work the next morning.

+/-

Tseng was doing sit-ups the following day, already working to strengthen the muscles that had been so weakened by his illness. Somehow his tattoo had survived the stigma without any damage at all, a small miracle, and he kept his shirt off while they ate breakfast, grateful to be free of the compression shirt for the first time in almost a year and a half.

Elena was all smiles and giggles and sunshine, making pancakes with whipped cream and wearing her favorite sleeveless blouse. She had a distinct tan line where the stigma had been, but she didn't seem to care.

Rude wasn't showing off, exactly, but he let Elena hop into his lap and sit there for breakfast, which he could not have done just days before. She knew it, and she bounced in his lap once or twice, making him smile when it didn't hurt. He would have permanent scars there, but no other damage had been done.

Even Rufus felt better, and he took a few shambling steps across the living area. Granted, his legs gave out and he collapsed on the floor, splitting his lip and bloodying his nose when his weakened arms weren't enough to catch his fall, but he laughed through the blood and that was alright.

Reno threw up three times that day and spent much of the afternoon napping.

+/

"We need to get Reno to a doctor," Rufus said quietly, curled in his armchair and sharing afternoon tea with Tseng.

"Hmm?"

"That ulcer. It's really hurting him, and now that I'm alright, he needs to be taken care of. He wouldn't hear of seeking treatment while I was ill."

"He may still object," Tseng pointed out, sipping slowly at his tea. He knew, thanks to Rude and Reno explaining, that Rufus didn't know Reno had the stigma. Rufus didn't need to know. All he knew, and all he would know if Tseng had anything to do with it, was that Reno was sick.

No one was sure why Reno's Geostigma hadn't been cured when the others' had. He had danced in the rain after they'd been healed, dragging Elena and Rude and even Tseng after him, then grabbing Rufus' chair and turning him in dizzying circles. He had gotten soaking wet, like they had. And his other injuries, mostly superficial things like scrapes, had healed cleanly. But the blight remained.

"Tell him it's an order."

+/

The Turks faked a doctor's visit and Reno was supplied with small candies made to look like medication in a very convincing pill bottle.

It was enough to fool Rufus for the time being.

+/-

It was very clear that the 'medicine' Reno was taking was not working. He continued to lose weight, and by the end of the summer, he had been reduced to little more than skin and bones. He worked because he wanted to, not because he should be, and nothing his fellow Turks said could convince him to stop.

Until he collapsed. Rufus was there, so there was no covering it up, and Rufus personally made the phone call that brought one of the Lodge's doctors to their rooms.

+/

"Geostigma," the doctor said shortly, exiting Reno's bedroom and slipping his gloves off.

"What? That's not possible."

"I assure you, President ShinRa, that he has internal Geostigma. I'll need to do some more specific tests to tell you exactly what damage has already been done o his organs and if any of it can be repaired, but the fact is, he's dying. Nothing I can do will change that."

"But…he was in the rain with me and his team. All of us were healed."

"I have heard of a few other patients with internal Geostigma dying recently. As far as I am aware, none of them were healed either." The doctor scribbled on a prescription pad. "We don't know why the stigma occasionally goes internal. It's possible that whatever causes the change is the same thing preventing the healing. Here." He tore off the sheet and handed it to Rufus. "These will help with the pain and the nausea, at least. Feed him light, bland foods, if he'll eat, and keep him hydrated. If he has any family, I'd get in contact with them as soon as possible."

Rufus swallowed hard, taking the paper and noting that the medications it called for were even more powerful than the ones he'd been taking. "How long?" he asked softly, voice tight.

"Weeks," the doctor said gently. "If he's lucky."

"Thank you."

Once the doctor was gone, Rufus turned on his remaining Turks.

"How could you?" he demanded."

"Sir?"

"You lied to me! About Reno."

"You didn't need to know."

"BULLSHIT! You lied to me about yourselves, and I've come to accept that. At least you weren't rotting inside. But Reno…how could you? How could you do this to me?"

"It was best if-"

"I don't care what's 'best'! He has weeks left! Weeks! If he's lucky! He's a goddamn skeleton with a heartbeat and you all had me thinking he had an ulcer!"

The Turks stopped trying to explain themselves. They let Rufus scream himself hoarse, and cry, and Elena cried with him.

Two weeks later, Reno died for the first time. He was revived without too much trouble.

He died again, several days later, and again the day after.

On the fourth death, Tseng cried openly as he personally brought the paddles down on Reno's chest to drag him back to them again.

After the eighth time, Elena broke down sobbing in the kitchen, and when she had been calmed down, she whimpered that even a cat could only have nine lives, so what would happen the next time Reno's heart stopped?

"Midgar," Rufus said abruptly. It was late, and he was lying on a couch with Rude at his back and Elena tucked between his legs. Tseng sat on the floor, quietly cleaning his knives. Reno was in bed, presumably asleep.

"I beg your pardon?"

"We need to go to Midgar."

"For what?"

"The church. Cloud's been healing the remaining people with Geostigma there."

"I don't think Reno will be able to handle the trip."

"What difference does it make?" Rufus demanded.

All three Turks looked at him.

"He's going to die if we stay here. He might die on the way to Midgar, but what if the water in the church can heal him? We risk everything taking him, but it's better than just watching him die here without even trying."

It was silent for a moment. Then Tseng put his knives away. Elena slithered out of Rufus' lap with a soft crackle of static where her pajamas slid against his.

"We'll prepare."

+/-

The flight was not a pleasant one. Reno was conscious for most of it, whimpering with the change in pressure playing hell on his ears and very, very airsick. He fell asleep or passed out twenty minutes before they landed, and while no one wanted to admit it, they were relieved.

There was nowhere near the church where they could set the helicopter down, so they landed as close as possible. Rude carried Reno the rest of the way, with Elena and Tseng and Rufus sticking close to him, all of them watching Reno more than they were watching where they walked.

Reno made a small, choked sort of sound as Tseng pulled the great carved doors open. He let go of the door handle at once and ran to Rude, who was eyeing Reno worriedly- they hadn't brought any medical supplies with them from the chopper.

"Inside," Rufus said curtly, not remarking on the fact that Reno was hardly breathing. "Now."

The pool was still and clear when they approached, surface scattered with lily petals that never withered or faded. Rude knelt at the edge of it, gently lowering Reno into the water.

He shuddered once and stopped breathing altogether.

"Submerge him," Rufus ordered, voice shaking. "Completely."

Rude obeyed.

Reno didn't respond.

"Again!"

"Sir," Tseng said gently.

"Shut up. Again, Rude."

"Sir, he's gone."

"I told you to be quiet!" Rufus pushed Tseng and Elena away from him and waded into the pool himself, pulling Reno's frail body out of Rude's hands. Once upon a time he would have struggled to hold Reno, because even when he was in shape, he couldn't support the weight that Reno carried on his lean frame, unusually dense muscle being one of the side effects of years of using drugs made with Mako. Now, though, he was light as a child in Rufus' arms, a frightening thing even without the slight, unnatural movement caused by the buoyancy and slight movement of the water.

"I don't-" Rude began, but Rufus was ignoring him. He pulled Reno under the water again, bracing him against one long leg and prying his mouth open.

"It must have to touch the stigma," he growled. When no water seemed to be going into Reno, he hauled the redhead back out of the water and sucked a mouthful up himself, sealing his lips to Reno and forcing the water into Reno's mouth. No telling which way it went, though a little bubbled out of his nose, but it was certainly going somewhere. "Live, goddamnit! I didn't survive grievous injury and debilitating illness and kidnapping just so you could die on me the minute I've recovered enough to get you back for all those stupid rubber darts you insisted on adhering to my forehead!"

Elena began to cry. Tseng held her close, and was in turn tucked into the warm curve of Rude's arm, ignoring the tears that fell on his head.

Rufus forced an almost comical amount of water into Reno's body, berating him all the while, shaking him now and then as if it would help get the water where he thought it needed to be. Reno moved limply in his hands, head lolling when he was pulled upright or bobbing obscenely in the water when he was on his back.

Finally, Tseng slipped into the water and pulled both his employer and his second in command out. Rufus was handed off to Rude and held still when he began to struggle. Reno was laid out on the floorboards. He knelt at Reno's side, silently neatening his suit and his hair, then closing the staring blue eyes.

"We should go," he said hoarsely.

"But-" Rufus began. Rude covered his mouth with one massive hand.

Tseng made to stand up. He stumbled on a broken piece of the stonework and fell, coming down hard on Reno with a startled grunt.

A rush of water and green sparks flooded out of Reno's mouth and nose, followed by a sudden, harsh inhale and another flood of liquid.

Rufus doubled his efforts to escape Rude's hold. Rude hoisted him off the ground entirely and heaved him over a broad shoulder, jamming his shoulder into his employer's diaphragm to keep him quiet as well as still.

Tseng scrambled off Reno and rolled him into his side to better facilitate the purging of all the water Rufus had forced into him. He heaved and retched violently, body convulsing with his efforts, green sparks skipping in the water and rising out of the puddles to fade into the air.

It took a long time before Reno rolled onto his back once more, panting and shaking. One pale hand groped blindly for something, fell on Tseng's hand, and squeezed it so hard the joints crackled.

"Whathefuck?" he wheezed.

Rufus managed to squiggle around in Rude's hold enough to reach down and grab the man's buttocks in both hands, squeezing hard and putting his nails to good use. Rude yelped and dropped him, and Rufus bolted to Reno's side. To the surprise of everyone watching, he slapped the redhead, then gathered him up and hugged him until he squeaked. The Turks fell on them both, gathering in a tight pile and just holding each other for a long while.

+/-

To say that Reno's recovery took awhile would have been an understatement. Repeated medical deaths, particularly the last one, erased the knowledge of how to do some things from his mind, and he forgot a few things. Nothing he deemed important, but walking was fairly important to the rest of his team, and, as Rufus pointed out, a lack of ability to use his legs meant Reno would not be topping him any time soon. A physical therapist was called immediately, and a speech therapist to help him with the slurring when he spoke. He fussed and argued but ultimately let them start their work.

+/-

It was spring again when Rufus crawled out of bed one morning and shuffled, yawning, towards the gym to get some exercise before his busy schedule tracked him down and distracted him.

In the gym, early sunlight was streaking through the windows, illuminating one of the large punching bags, the floor beneath it, and the long, lean figure dancing around the punching bag in nothing but shorts, and headband, and careful wrapping around his hands, ducking and feinting nimbly as a young chocobo.

Reno noticed his audience after a few minutes and bounced over to Rufus, no trace of even the limp he had been dragging around for months. He grinned lazily, fully aware of what his nearly naked, sweaty, terribly dangerous self was doing to Rufus just by standing there.

"Like whatcha see?" he purred. There was still a funny sound to some of his words, but it blended almost seamlessly with his accent and his language, and the things it did to his voice when he was being seductive were outlawed in some parts of the world.

Rufus swallowed hard.

"I see your legs have finally decided to obey," he managed.

"Yeah, you could say that."

"Feel like sparring a little?"

"You bet."

"Winner tops."

"You mean I top."

"We'll have to see, won't we?"

"Oh, you're on." Reno headed back towards the bag, where a pair of thin protective gloves were lying on the floor, likely left behind when he had decided he wanted more of a workout for his hands. He tossed them to Rufus and bounced into an open area of practice mats and grinned, beckoning. "C'mere and get your ass kicked, Rufus."

Rufus laughed, put the gloves on, and jogged over to the mats. He was going to lose; he already knew it, and he couldn't care less.