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It's 8.45 am, and Lazard Deusericus waiting for the elevator on the infirmary floor of the Shin-Ra building. He should have been in his office half an hour ago, but wanted to stop off at the infirmary on his way up to check on the condition of SOLDIER First Class Genesis Rhapsodos, a primadonna if ever there was one. The day before yesterday, Genesis was wounded in the shoulder while sparring in the sim room with his fellow First Classes, and he's been lying in that bed feeling sorry for himself ever since, although the damage done to him is as nothing compared to the wreck he and his two friends made of the sim room; this is the second time they've trashed the place, and Lazard does not know where he will find the budget for repairs. He hates the idea of going cap in hand to the President. That would only make him look incompetent.
Sometimes he wishes his Big Three would just grow up already.
The elevator comes and he steps inside. Just as the doors are closing, suddenly, without any warning, he sneezes violently.
When he recovers from the sneeze he becomes aware of an irritating tickle in his throat. He coughs, but the tickle remains. The inside of his nose and the linings of his eyelids feel itchy too. He rubs his eyes, sneezes, coughs, and coughs and coughs again. He's in the middle of a cough when the elevator doors open.
"Sir!" says his secretary, standing up in alarm at the sight of him doubled over, red-faced. "Are you all right?"
"I think - something's - gone down the wrong way. Can you get me some water, Linda?"
This motherly woman brings him a glass of icy water from the cooler, watches him drink it, and follows him into his office as if she expects him to collapse any minute and wants to be there to catch him when he does. But the cold water seems to have done the trick; he's breathing more easily. His nose still itches, though.
"That'll be - " He erupts in a sneeze before he can say all, Linda.
"Oh, you've caught a cold," she informs him.
He wants to tell her that she's wrong, but another fit of coughing interrupts him. It's a very chesty cough. Wheezy.
"You take it easy, Director," she says. "I'm just nipping down to the shop. I'll be back in a jiffy."
She goes to call the elevator. Lazard rummages around in his drawer for a packet of tissues. His mind is still on Genesis. The wounded SOLDIER is milking this current drama for all he's worth, sulking in his hospital bed, refusing to get up, and generally revelling in being the centre of attention, although there's nothing much wrong with him that Lazard can see. Genesis claims his wound isn't healing properly, but Lazard suspects the wound to his pride is what really ails him.
Fifteen minutes later, his secretary returns, bearing a packet of honey and lemon throat lozenges and a small bottle of aspirin tablets. She sets them on his desk blotter and gives him her stern disciplinarian look - a look, he feels, more suited to a librarian hushing unruly students than to the personal assistant of the youngest-ever Board executive in the history of the Shin-Ra corporation.
Thanks to nepotism, his conscience reminds him.
"You really are looking a bit peaky, dear," she says. "Are you sure you shouldn't take the day off?"
"Quite sure," says Lazard. He dreads to think what further trouble his three Firsts might get into without him around to keep them reined in. Also, he really wishes his secretary would stop calling him dear. She makes him feel five years old. He thinks this is probably deliberate.
"Had a bit of a wild night last night, did we?" she asks. "Burning the candle at both ends?"
No doubt she pictures him making the rounds of the upper plate night-clubs in the company of well-groomed, well-mannered, well-connected society debutantes, girls on the lookout to make an advantageous marriage with a man going up in the world.
Lazard laughs inwardly. What would his secretary say if he told her that last night he spent three hours training at the Grand Horn Fight Club in Sector 4, followed by flaming curry and iced beers at the Yalo Yalo and a fast shag down the back alley with a boy from the fight club whom he knows only as Big Moe, and who knows him only as Eric. His secretary might be shocked to hear it - but then again, she might not; she's been working for Shin-Ra since before he was born, she's been PA to the Director of SOLDIER for years, and Assistant PA to Director Heidegger before that. There isn't much that fazes her. In fact, there have been times when he's resented her wealth of experience. She should have retired when the last Director left. Lazard believes she's been kept on as his baby sitter.
"Well, you're only young once," she comforts him.
He opened his mouth to reply, but starts coughing instead. She pats him vigorously between the shoulders - more like a slap, really. "You should go back to bed, dear. I'll hold the fort here."
His nose has started running; he can feel mucus dripping down his lip. Quickly he presses a fresh tissue to his nostrils. The skin is tightening across his cheeks; his eyes are dry and gritty, his sinuses swollen with liquid fire. This can't be a cold. Colds don't come on so quickly. He was fine when he got up this morning. Could he have picked up some germ in the infirmary - or is this his old feather allergy acting up again? But where could he have come into contact with feathers? No wild birds live in this sterile city; he has never seen so much as a single feral pigeon. The only birds in Midgar are the draught chocobos down in the slums. Could he have breathed in chocobo dander last night, when he was out in the alleyway pressing Big Moe up against the wall? It's not impossible, he supposes.
Damn. He can't be sick. Lazard Deusericus doesn't do sick. He's proud of the fact that he's never once taken a single sick day in the seven years that he's been working for Shin-Ra. He's never needed one. He simply doesn't get ill, not since - that time.
On a reflex, his gloved fingers brush across the almost invisible hairline scar running across his throat, souvenir of that night, twelve years ago, when someone tried to murder him and almost succeeded. He was told then, and he still believes, that without the high levels of mako running in his veins he would have died.
Mako speeds up the body's natural healing process. It also boosts human immune systems. Slum kids who live close to the reactors never get sick: this is a well-documented phenomenon. They may starve to death, or fall under a train during a game of chicken on the railway tracks, or simply disappear, never to be heard of again, but they don't die in the epidemics of measles and diphtheria that periodically sweep through under the plate. Of course there's a trade-off; nothing comes for free in this world. Some of Lazard's school friends grew hair in strange places, or claws instead of toenails, or webs between their fingers. Some, like him, had eyes that glowed faintly in the dark. SOLDIER eyes.
His SOLDIERS never get sick, either.
They, too, are freaks of nature. Lab experiments; mutations; victims in their own right. Thinking of them as victims has helped him to forgive the fact that they fight and kill (and die) for Shin-Ra.
"Should I cancel your eleven o'clock, dear?" she asks.
Heidegger wants to discuss some new ideas for joint training exercises. If Lazard puts him off today, he'll have to deal with him tomorrow. Best get it over with.
"No, just - bring me some tea, please."
While she's brewing the tea he takes two of the aspirins, washing them down with water, and then opens the packet of lozenges, put one in his mouth, and begins to suck. The effect is only somewhat soothing. If he doesn't start feeling better soon, he'll have to try something else.
But enough of that. There's work to be done. A folder labelled "S/PSM-Sol.E mu-egl 5.6.1998 Personnel Report: Recommendations for Promotion. Confidential" sit waiting on the top of his in-tray. Lazard opens it up and begins reading the resumes, refusing to be distracted by the pain behind his eyes. By the time his secretary sets a hot cup of sweet tea by his elbow, he has reached the file titled Fair, Zack. The rattle of the cup against its china saucer breaks his concentration; he leans back, takes off his glasses, rubs his sore, watering eyes.
Fair, Zack. SOLDIER 3rd class. Place of birth: Gongaga. Age: 16 yrs 4 mos.
The median age of new recruits is fifteen years and five months. No one over the age of eighteen will be accepted into the program. That's company policy. The average age for all SOLDIERS, from Third to First class, is twenty-two.
Lazard himself was fifteen years old when he joined Shin-Ra. He'd done well at school, won all the prizes, but a university education was beyond their means, and in any case study for its own sake held little appeal for him. He was impatient to start earning money. In Shin-Ra, they said, talent was rewarded; young Lazard believed that if he worked hard and used his brain, he would go places. And so it proved. He began his career as a clerk in the materia warehouse, and after three months was promoted to Despatcher. Five months later he was promoted again, to Deputy Section Manager. Six months after that, the Section Manager took earlier retirement and Lazard was given his job.
People started talking. Lazard pretended he couldn't hear the whispering going on behind his back, but privately he wondered if the rumours were true. Young and arrogant though he might be, he was also smart enough to know that no sixteen-year-old boy, however brilliant, rose from warehouse clerk to Section Manager in the space of little more than a year on the strength of his merits alone.
Plus, there was the physical resemblance to be considered: the nose, the shape of the mouth, the chin, the colour and texture of the hair. Just because he didn't want to see it, didn't mean it wasn't true.
His mother always said he took after his father, who (she said) had died before he was born. She said his father had been a good man, fun-loving, handsome and kind. He would have adored you, she said. He always wanted a son. He would have been so proud of you.
As his meteoric rise up the corporate ladder continued, Lazard became more and more certain that she was lying.
He was one month shy of his twenty-first birthday when they gave him a Director's chair. After the ceremony he shook hands with his new colleagues, Heidegger, Scarlet, Palmer, Hojo, and received the congratulations of the President, who pressed his hand warmly and held on to it for a few moments longer than etiquette strictly called for. Then he went downstairs to inspect his new office. He was not surprised to find Commander Veld waiting for him. Apparently someone - his father? the Chief Turk himself? - had decided the time was ripe for him to know the truth. He thought it best to feign surprise and delight.
"What happened to Colonel Gibson?" he asked.
Colonel Gibson was the previous Director of SOLDIER, a veteran military man, with over twenty years of combat experience. Lazard's experience in the field was zero.
"Retired," Veld replied. "Health concerns."
Absorbed in these memories, it takes Lazard a moment to realise that his secretary is standing in the doorway. She always does this when she wants to tell him something, even though they have an intercom. "It's Mr Tseng," she says. "He's here to see you. From the Turks," she adds unnecessarily. There is only one Tseng in the Shin-Ra building.
Lazard's stomach knots. It's partly fear, partly surprise, and partly excitement. There are few people in Shin-Ra he would like to know better. Tseng is one of them. First on the list, to be honest, and not only because his good looks set Lazard's pulse racing. He's fascinated by the contradictions this Turk represents. What's more, in a society where bastard and Woot are interchangeable insults, he thinks that he and Tseng might have a lot in common - might even, just possibly, be fellow travellers. Tseng has always presented himself as a friend. Surely that must mean something, because in this building everything, every glance, every gesture, every simple act of human kindness, means more than meets the eye.
Tseng enters, impeccably dressed as usual, and takes a seat, saying that he would like to talk about the security arrangements for the delegation travelling to Wutai next week. Lazard's eyes are drawn to Tseng's ungloved hands, resting calmly on his blue serge knees. What handsome hands they are, square and sinewy, with long strong fingers, meticulously clean. One would never guess from looking at them what the man did for a living.
A hot-cold shiver passes through Lazard. The feeling is not entirely unpleasant.
Tseng says, "Director, you don't look well."
Lazard looks up from Tseng's beautiful hands to see an expression he's tempted to describe as concern in Tseng's eyes - his fine, dark eyes, eloquent in his pale impassive face. Lazard has often wondered whether this Turk would be considered handsome among his own people, or whether it is only to the aesthetics of an easterner such as Lazard that his facial contours, enhanced by the spice of exoticism, are so pleasing.
"It's just a cold," he replies.
"That's not like you. You never fall ill."
Lazard catches himself feeling flattered that Tseng has noticed. Ridiculous; it's the Turk's job to know. There's probably a note in the file they keep on him, commenting on his robust immune system.
His secretary brings more tea, and a mug of black coffee for the Turk. To Lazard's mind there's something discordant about seeing those elegant hands wrapped round a clunky, serviceable, standard-issue company mug stamped with the Shinra logo, while his own tea is served in a delicate Ashikirisoupattern porcelain cup rimmed with gold. He wants to say, Tseng, my friend, if I may call you that, what are you doing here, so far from home? What brought you to Midgar? Why do you serve that man, my father? I can't believe it's for the money. When I look at you, I can't believe that.
Instead, they talk about which SOLDIERs will be available to escort Shinra's envoys to Wutai next week. Lazard is terribly conscious of his red nose and blocked sinuses. He feels his fever continue to rise, feels a line of hives prickling up the underside of his arms, but does his best not to show his discomfort. He doesn't want Tseng to hurry away.
Tseng makes no further comment on Lazard's state of health until their discussion has concluded, when he rises to take his leave. "If I may be frank," he says politely (for he is always perfectly polite; he wears his politeness like a bullet-proof vest), "You sound terrible. Why don't you take rest of the day off? Go back to bed."
"It's just a cold," Lazard stubbornly insists. "I don't want to give in to it."
Tseng smiles. Is Lazard a fool for detecting a hint of approval in that smile? "I know," he says. "Time off sick just means a bigger pile of work on your desk when you get back. All the same, look after yourself, Director. We don't want you ending up with pneumonia."
The chances of that happening are non-existent, but Lazard thinks it wiser not to comment. He has no idea how much the Turks know about his childhood. Certainly someone as close the President as his own bastard son would have been the subject of a thorough investigation. If they've done their due diligence, they must know that his Shinra eyes are of a more than natural blue. He operates on the assumption that they know about that time. More: he believes they are the ones who did it. Tidying up lose ends is part of their job, after all.
The real question is: why did they change their minds about him?
"Keep an close eye on him, Linda," Tseng says as he passes her desk on his way out. "Don't let him work himself into the grave."
His concern sounds genuine. Lazard wishes he could take it at face value.
He is attracted to Tseng. Of course he is; Tseng is a very attractive man, and Lazard has been conscious of this attraction from the moment they first met. Whether the attraction is mutual is something he neither knows nor wishes to find out. There's no point. Nothing can come of it. Lazard is already playing with fire; he can't afford to take any unnecessary risks, and sleeping with a Turk - any of them, but Tseng especially - would be tantamount to suicide. Tseng's out of bounds. Full stop. End of discussion.
It's not a big deal. Midgar is full of attractive men. Lovers, sexual partners, one-night stands: these are easily come by, and if that were all he wanted, he would not waste as much time as he does thinking about Tseng.
But a friend, now - a good friend is hard to find. Especially in this building.
Tseng's gestures of friendship are the temptation Lazard is finding it difficult to resist. He wants so badly to believe they are sincere that he fears he is in danger of deceiving himself -
The click of his secretary's heels causes him to look up. Once again she is standing in his doorway. "Field Marshall Heidegger to see you," she says.
He feels his fever cool, even as his headache intensifies.
.
At 2.15 pm Lazard takes the last tissue from the box and blows his nose for perhaps the thousandth time that day. He's burning up, chilled to the bone. It feels like there's a rock sitting on his chest. "Linda," he calls, staring at the form on his desk, "What is this?"
"That's a S/PSM-Sol.three ninety-five," she calls back.
"I can see what it is."
The sheer discomfort of being inside his own skin - his clammy, scratchy, shivering skin - is making him crabby. He sneezes.
She says "Sephiroth handed it in while you were having your little nap."
He blames the aspirin for knocking him out. He hadn't intended to fall asleep; he'd only shut his eyes for a moment. Prying them open again was pure torture. The clock says he slept for two hours. He feels as if he could sleep for fifty years.
"Sephiroth's refusing another mission?" He coughs. "Did he give a reason?"
"It's there on the form, in the space marked 'reason for refusal'."
"It just says trivial mission. That's not an acceptable reason. And there's nothing trivial about clearing monsters out of the slums. People are dying down there. Who the hell does he think he is?"
"Well - ahem." Her deferential throat-clearing is ripe with significance. "It's really more of a third class mission, don't you think? He's been asking again if you know when they can expect to go back to the front."
Two months ago Sephiroth, Angeal and Genesis were pulled out of Wutai on the insistence of Lord Godo, who refused to sit down at the bargaining table while the three demons, as he called them, remained on Wuteng soil. The Company, eager to put an end to this unprofitable war, agreed to Godo's request, only to find that he has no authority over the Engetsu, who still refuse to lay down their arms. From their base in Fort Tamblin the Engetsu have carried their particularly brutal brand of guerrilla war into Shin-Ra occupied territories, ambushing supply trains and torching the villages of "collaborators'. If the forthcoming peace talks cannot find a solution, a return to full-scale war will be almost inevitable.
A metallic shrieking interrupts Lazard's thoughts. His secretary is feeding a pencil into the electric sharpener. The awful sound makes him feel for a moment as if his own head is in a grinder. "You should get Angeal to talk to Sephiroth," she shouts.
The insides of his ears are itching now, itching and burning so badly he can't think; he longs to take his own pencil and force it down his earhole as if it too were an electric sharpener and scratch, scratch, scratch.
He can't go on like this. Stronger measures are called for.
"Linda," he shouts back, "Could you go to the shop and get me some more of those lozenges?" The lozenges are in fact useless and taste nasty to boot, but he needs some excuse to get rid of her for fifteen minutes. As soon as he hears the elevator doors close behind her, he gets up and goes to a cabinet at the back of his office. The drawers are colour-coded. He unlocks the one with the green label, opens it, and takes out a Cure materia.
According to the Shin-Ra Electric Company's official Materia Handler's Manual, the use of Restore and Heal in non-combat, non-life-threatening situations is strictly forbidden. There have been some murmurs in scientific circles about the negative long-term effects of materia usage, effects that seem to be aggravated when the materia in question is man-made. Best practice nowadays dictates that where time is not of the essence, the body's own healing processes should be allowed to take their course. As Director of SOLDIER, Lazard would have no qualms about severely reprimanding any Second or Third caught casting Cure on himself for something as minor and self-limiting as an allergic reaction.
A green glow briefly fills his office. It's like bathing in sunshine: a tremendous sensation of well-being illuminates and warms his body. The relief is instantaneous. He can breathe again. His temperature has returned to normal. The painful swelling in his throat subsides. His head feels blissfully clear, his mind sharp as a razor.
Sitting back down at his desk, Lazard picks up the 395 form and considers what to do next. To tell the truth, he shares Sephiroth's frustration. Every day the despatches from Wutai bring news of fresh losses for the department; the third classes manning the outpost garrisons are being decimated by the Engetsu, while the three Firsts, who could wipe out all resistance to Shin-ra in less than a week, remain confined to Midgar, on pest control duty.
Still, an order is an order.
If Sephiroth refuses to take this mission, Lazard has no means of forcing him to obey. What punishment could he threaten him with? Docking his pay? Sephiroth is nineteen years old and already has more money in the bank than most people see in a lifetime. Loss of privileges? What privileges? Sephiroth lives to fight. All he wants is to go back to Wutai.
Angeal has told Lazard plainly that morale in the department is at an all-time low. The thirds feel their lives are not valued. There is talk of desertion. Angeal has also intimated that Genesis is growing restless, discontented, snarkier than ever.
Perhaps they think their Director does not understand. But he understands, and he sympathises.
None of this changes the fact that the slums are full of monsters and the people expect Shinra to do something about it. This order comes from the President. Send the Firsts in, let 'em put on a show. Get it broadcast on the news. Show them Shinra cares. The people love their Heroes. And Shinra needs some good PR to sweeten the rate hike planned for the end of the month.
Sephiroth will do it if Angeal tells him to. Yet Lazard hates the idea of asking Angeal to intervene. It feels like an admission of defeat.
He is well aware that the Board appointed him to be Director of SOLDIER in name only. Nobody has said so to his face, not in so many words, but it's obvious. You don't put an inexperienced youth barely out of his teens at the head of a department of super-warriors expecting that he's actually going to run the show. One week after he received his promotion, ten-year-old Rufus, who has never experienced a day's hunger or a moment's fear in his life, was publicly proclaimed the heir to the throne of Shin-Ra - that is, Vice-President. Lazard understood then that SOLDIER was his consolation prize. This is as far as you go, my son.
If he'd been given a choice, he would have asked for Finance. Lazard understands instinctively how money works; it's in his blood. He did not, then, understand the military mindset. But he is learning. And he can see now that he never had a hope of being given Finance. Money is power. SOLDIER is purely glamour.
Gil has no soul. It's a tool, a weapon. Lazard wouldn't have lost sleep at night worrying about the welfare of the money in his charge. His SOLDIERs, though, are men. They have families, dreams and honour; they are capable of feeling pain, of dying, and of being betrayed. Their humanity complicates matters. He has grown to respect their courage and loyalty, and he is determined to protect them from exploitation by those members of the board (Scarlet, Hojo) who cannot distinguish between a human being and a weapon.
His hatred of the company is becoming less personal and more - principled? Paternal? Can he call it that, when half of his SOLDIERs are older than he is?
He would not openly defy the President. He's not ready for that - but also, he is coming more and more to believe that outright defiance is not the way forward. The world has come to rely on Shinra: one cannot simply rip its life support system away. Change will have to come from within. He doesn't know what he will do, yet. For the time being he has his hands full teaching the men to trust him, and keeping his Big Three under control.
Because the dose of Cure has temporarily enhanced his senses, he hears the sound of the lift rising in the elevator shaft and knows it is his secretary returning. The lift doors open; he takes a tissue and loudly blows his nose, not wanting her to guess the reason for his sudden and complete recovery. Her heels come clicking towards his office. As she passes her desk, the phone rings. He can hear the voice at the other end of line. It's Sephiroth, and he doesn't sound happy. Something's happening down in the infirmary. He wants the Director to come.
Lazard summons the elevator. He doesn't have to wait long, but when the doors open he sees that the lift is already occupied by Tseng and Cissnei. They break off their conversation to greet him. Well, they can't have been talking about anything important. Everyone knows the lifts are bugged.
To Lazard's heightened senses, the smell of the two Turks is almost overwhelming. She smells of camomile shampoo and toothpaste; Tseng smells of expensive aftershave; these smells overlay their own distinct, intrinsic scent, the smells of their warm skin and their hair, their sweat and their sex. Lazard thinks that if he were a dog he would wag his tail; he wouldn't be able to help it.
Tseng says, "I see you're better, Director."
"Have you been sick, sir?" asks Cissnei, her golden eyes filled with concern.
It's impressive, the amount of human warmth these cold-blooded killers can inject into their voices. Every single member of the Department of Administrative Research radiates, in his or her own unique way, that most indefinable - and most untrustworthy - of qualities: charm. Veld wouldn't hire them without it. Being charming, being helpful, being friendly, lulling you into a false sense of security - it's all part of their job, and Lazard knows he will be safer if he can keep reminding himself of that fact.
"Just a twelve-hour bug," he tells Cissnei.
"You were dead on your feet when I saw you this morning," says Tseng.
"I took a couple of aspirin."
"Extra-strength aspirin?" Tseng sounds amused.
They stop at the Turks' floor and Cissnei gets out, throwing an enigmatic look at Tseng over her shoulder. The doors close; he and Tseng are now alone together, alone in a very small space. To be honest, the frisson of nerves he's experiencing is rather pleasant than otherwise. It reminds him of the time he went parachuting with SOLDIER, standing in the helicopter's open doorway, gathering the courage to jump.
Tseng leans back against the curve of plexiglass, arms folded. Lazard can't help noticing how clean the line of his white collar is against the sharp angle of his throat and jaw. How, Lazard wonders, does he manage to get such a smooth, close shave? Lazard's own facial hair is peach fuzz; he can skip a day and no one would notice.
"You're headed for the infirmary?" asks Tseng.
"Yes."
"So am I."
"Ah."
"The President has asked me to find out what's happening with Genesis. Why hasn't he been discharged yet?"
Good question, thinks Lazard. The Big Three are supposed to be indestructible. He would give anything to know what exactly it was that Shin-Ra did to them to make them that way, but so far his attempts at industrial espionage have met with failure. The science department keeps its records in the digital equivalent of a quadruple-locked, lead-lined, cast iron safe buried in a concrete bunker a mile underground.
"The sooner they're back on active duty, the better," says Tseng. "They're bored. And when they get bored, they start destroying things. This building. Each other."
No kidding, thinks Lazard.
"I wonder what they'll do when the war is over," Tseng adds, casually - as if such a remark could ever be casual, when Lazard lies awake at night worrying about this very thing. What possible role can peacetime provide for three young men whose sole purpose in life is to kill?
The lift stops. They have arrived. The doors part to reveal a medical scene: green walls, yellow linoleum floors, a reception desk with a computer, plastic pot plants, IV-units, two orderlies pushing an empty trolley-bed, and a nurse with a clipboard. She gives the two men a respectful greeting and guides them through the corridors until, in the distance, a familiar figure can be seen pacing up and down. His long silver hair trails behind him. Lazard hurries forward. "Sephiroth," he says, "Where's Genesis?"
"In there," says Sephiroth, gesturing at a very firmly shut door. "Hollander's giving him a transfusion."
"Blood transfusion?" Lazard exclaims. "Why? Genesis told me it was just a flesh wound."
"Hollander says it's not healing."
Tseng has come up behind them and is listening intently.
"I wanted to be the donor," says Sephiroth. "But Hollander refused. He said I wasn't a match."
"So, who?" says Lazard, though he knows. Angeal isn't out here with Sephiroth, so he must be on the other size of that door. Lazard presses on the handle, trying to open it.
"Locked," says Sephiroth. The normally phlegmatic SOLDIER is clearly distressed at having been shut out from his friends.
Lazard outranks Hollander. He raps loudly on the door, wondering if Tseng will intervene to stop him, or if he should be glad to have the Turk here as a witness. In Shin-Ra, the left hand doesn't always know what the right hand is doing.
Dr Hollander is an unprepossessing man, slump-shouldered, doughy round the middle, dressed in an old t-shirt, ill-fitting slacks, a grubby lab-coat, and slip-on sandals to accommodate his broad flat feet. His hair looks as if he never combs it, his beard likewise. Yet he has power: he knows something Lazard doesn't know.
Lazard says, "I want to see my SOLDIER."
Hollander's eyes flick over Lazard's shoulder to Tseng. "I'm sorry, Director, but that's not advisable. We're in the middle of a delicate procedure right now."
From the corner of his eye Lazard sees something dark come fluttering out of Genesis' room. It's small and delicate: a little black feather, probably from the sick man's pillow. Well, that's one mystery solved. Lazard nose begins prickling, but he ignores the sensation. "Why isn't he getting better? Have you tried Cure?"
"It won't take. The wound is leaking mako."
Leaking mako? Is that even possible? "I want to see him," Lazard demands again. Then he sneezes, loudly.
"You're sick," Hollander declares, like a man pulling a trump card out of his sleeve. "I can't let you in if you're sick, no, no. The risk of infection is far too high."
"I'm not sick," says Sephiroth, stepping forward.
"No bystanders," Hollander snaps. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a patient who needs my care - "
He shuts the door in Lazard's face and locks it. Sephiroth clenches his fists, but masters the urge to punch the door in. "This is my fault," he says to no one in particular. Turning his back on them, he stalks away down the corridor. Lazard wants to follow him, but can't, because he can't see properly: his eyes are watering, his nose is running, his sinuses burning. Hives are popping up all over his soft parts. His joints ache.
Tseng, who has not uttered a word, watches him curiously.
"Allergy," Lazard snuffles. He's furious with himself for giving way to weakness in the very moment when his men need him to be strong.
Tseng says, quite gently, "Let Hollander take care of Genesis. You should take care of yourself."
You could intervene, thinks Lazard. You could make Hollander open this door.
But Tseng doesn't offer, and Lazard will not humble himself by asking. He can't think straight with his head like this, stuffed full of phlegm and pain. He needs to get back to his office, fix himself up, and then decide what to do. The mere thought of the relief that will wash through his body when he casts Cure induces a craving so intense that he has to hurry - sprint, even, bouncing off the walls several times in his haste, and almost knocking over a cart of medical instruments because his vision is so blurry.
Tseng doesn't follow. Lazard presses the call button and stumbles into the lift. The allergic reaction is worse this time, and it's happening much faster: his throat has begun to swell, and his tongue feels too big for his mouth. He's disoriented - can't even tell if the elevator is going up or down.
Down, as it happens. The doors open on the lobby, but the crowd of people draws back when they see Lazard in the lift, gasping for breath, his weeping eyes swollen almost shut. He finds the right number on the floor panel and presses it. The doors slide shut again. The elevator rises.
At last, at last, the door open on his own floor. He staggers out, one hand braced against the wall. With a cry his secretary runs to him, shocked by his appearance, but he pushed straight past her and, with the last ounce of his energy - for he can barely breathe - he shuts and locks the door, and turns around.
Tseng is waiting for him. Of course. Looking past Tseng, he sees that his colour-coded drawer is open. The Turks must have keys to all his drawers. Of course. His Cure materia is in Tseng's hand.
"Give me that," Lazard wheezes.
"Materia is not the answer," Tseng replies.
Lazard lunges for the materia, feebly and without success. Tseng easily sidesteps him, and Lazard falls to the floor. In another moment he's going to lose consciousness. He's going to die and the Turks will write it up as natural causes. Maybe they are the ones who planted the feathers. Death by allergy. Cunning. But who will look after his SOLDIERs when he's gone?
He doesn't feel the sharp prick of the needle as it plunges through the fabric of his trousers into the muscle of his thigh. He only realises, very suddenly, that he can breathe again. He opens his eyes, and sees Tseng straightening up, syringe in hand. "Better, Director?" he asks.
Lazard inhales deeply, once, twice. What fools we are, he thinks, to take breath for granted. Surely there is no greater pleasure than filling one's lungs with air. It's the sweetest thing in the world.
"Yes," he says. "Where - ?"
"From the infirmary. Can you stand up?"
"In a minute."
Someone's hammering on the door. "What's going on?" cries the secretary. "Director, answer me."
Lazard looks at Tseng. Tseng says, "Mrs Pretorius, Director Lazard is feeling unwell. I'm going to escort him home. Cancel his appointments for the rest of the day. For tomorrow, too." He holds out a hand to Lazard and adds, "Come on. Let me help you."
He drapes Lazard's arm around his shoulders, put his own arm round Lazard's waist. Lazard has seen his own men walk thus, limping home from training exercises or from the battlefield, arms wrapped round each other, lending each other strength. It feels good to have someone to lean on.
Back at his apartment in the Shin-Ra housing on Warehouse Street, Lazard allows himself to be persuaded to lie down - though on his luxurious leather couch, not the bed. It would feel too awkward to get into bed while Tseng is there. So he changes out of his suit into sweats and a long-sleeved t-shirt, and stretches out on his couch, and Tseng puts on some music and turns it down so that it's like a lullaby in the background, and he insists that Lazard take an antihistamine tablet, and when Lazard has swallowed it he says he'll fix him a pick-me-up, something better than materia. Lazard's imagination runs riot for a second. "What do you mean?"
"Old Wutaian herbal remedy," says Tseng. "May I use your kitchen?"
Oh, disappointment. Lazard breathes out. "Help yourself."
Tseng goes into the kitchen and starts opening and closing cupboards. Lazard's mind slips at once into its accustomed groove: he wonders what exactly Tseng is looking for, and whether this whole elaborate set-up has been a ruse to gain access to his apartment, and perhaps to his trust. But then something passes through him, like a wave of disgust; it's his soul, revolting. He is sick and tired of thinking like this.
Tseng saved his life just now. If that's not the act of a friend, what is?
"Tseng?" he says.
"Yes?"
"How did you know I was using Cure?"
"You got better too fast. It wasn't natural," Tseng replies from the kitchen. "And there was a glow in your eyes. Cissnei saw it too."
Lazard thinks for a minute. Then he says, "What's the problem with Materia? It's not addictive."
"It doesn't create a physical dependency," Tseng corrects him. "Materia addiction is a psychological thing. People get hooked on the rush of well-being Cure produces, but the rush comes from curing an injury. No injury, no rush. We've had Turks who deliberately put themselves into danger, took insane risks, even wounded themselves, for the sake of the Cure. You don't want to go down that road. Especially - " He doesn't finish the sentence.
Lazard can hear the kettle boiling. "Especially what?" he asks.
"Since you're still young."
Lazard is pretty sure that this is not what he was originally going to say.
Tseng comes out of the kitchen carrying two steaming mugs. The one he keeps for himself is coffee. The one he hands to Lazard contains a hot toddy. Lazard can't help laughing, though his chest still aches and the laugh comes out more like a wheeze. "Old Wutaian herbal recipe?"
"Well, the tea is herbal, the whiskey's aged, and the ginger's from Wutai. I can't speak for the honey."
Lazard tries a sip. It's good: sweet, spicy, warm in the pit of his stomach. He asks Tseng, "Don't you miss it?"
"What?"
"Home. Wutai. Don't you get homesick? You must have family there. What do they think of you working for Shin-Ra?"
Tseng gives him an odd look. "I've never been to Wutai."
"Oh," says Lazard. It sounds ridiculous, but what else can he say? Sorry?
"To the best of my knowledge, I was born here in Midgar."
"Oh. But - your parents -"
"Yes, one presumes they came from Wutai. I don't remember them. I was living on the streets when Veld took me in. If they didn't die, then they must have abandoned me."
"Oh. I thought - I could have sworn someone told me you came from Wutai."
"People often make that mistake. I don't necessarily bother to correct them. The truth is, I can't even speak the language properly, though Veld paid for years for a special tutor to teach me. It was gil down the drain. I have no gifts as a linguist. Then, after I was expelled from school - "
"Expelled?" Lazard is astonished. Some of the others - Reno, for example, or that gangster Two-Guns - he can easily imagine bouncing from one reform school to another. But Tseng? Tseng was born to be a prefect.
"For getting into fights," Tseng explains. "The headmaster told Veld I was a bad influence. I didn't care; I thought school was a waste of my time. All I'd ever wanted was to be a Turk. Veld had to have a suit made for me; none of the ones in the stockroom were small enough. I still have it," he adds.
Small enough? "How old were you?"
"Thirteen, probably."
"Probably?"
"There's some uncertainty about my exact age. Veld thinks I was four when he found me."
"And you were thirteen when you became a Turk.A" Lazard's doing his best to sound neutral. "That's - young." Privately, he's both appalled and astonished. It has never occured to him before that Tseng - Tseng, of all people - might be a victim too.
"Cissnei was younger. She started on the payroll when she was ten. But that's because Shin-Ra was paying her school fees. Veld paid for mine himself, out of his own pocket."
My father paid for nothing, thinks Lazard. But he will. To Tseng he says, "Veld's got a good eye. He saw your potential."
"He believed in me when I didn't believe in myself," says Tseng, and there's something so heartfelt, so spontaneous about this confession that Lazard is taken aback; he's sure Tseng didn't plan to say that. Tseng himself seems a little surprised at what just came out of his mouth. He pauses a moment, collecting himself, and then continues in a lighter tone, "Although there were times when he must have wondered if his faith was misplaced. I wasn't a very promising rookie. On my first real mission I screwed up so badly, I thought he was going to shoot me on the spot, or worse, send me back to school. I spent months on filing duty before he trusted me again with anything important. You should finish your drink, Director. It's getting cold."
Obediently Lazard drinks the rest of his hot toddy, and for a minute there is silence between them - an comfortable silence, which neither of them feels any urgent need to disturb. Lazard cannot remember the last time he felt this relaxed in another person's presence. He blames Tseng's voice, which is surely more potent than any materia, deep, calm, reassuring, with now and again that undercurrent of humour rising to the surface. These little glimpses he's offering of his life behind the scenes feel to Lazard like a gift. Finally, he thinks, I'm getting to know him.
His cup is empty. He puts it down. "You're not what you seem," he says. "Are you?"
Tseng smiles. "Who is?"
His smile is beautiful; Lazard's heart turns over and he has to look away. It's probably a good thing that the whiskey's finished; one more slug, and he might feel brave enough to do something stupid.
When he looks again, he catches Tseng staring at his throat. Their eyes meet; Tseng seems almost embarrassed. "The scar," he says. "What happened?"
He really doesn't know, thinks Lazard. This realisation makes him absurdly happy. "Someone mugged me. When I was a kid."
"Who?"
One of yours. But of course Lazard doesn't say this. "I never saw their face. They grabbed me from behind -"
"Pulled your head back, slit your windpipe. I can see. You were lucky; they were amateurs. A professional would have cut you from here - " the tip of tseng's finger touches the skin just below Lazard's jaw, where a pulse is throbbing - "To here." The fingertip draws a circle under Lazard's chin. "You seem to make a habit of cheating death, Director," he smiles.
The warmth from the toddy is spreading through Lazard's veins. His limbs are beginning to grow heavy; his eyelids too. Maybe it's the whiskey, or maybe the antihistamine, or a combination of both. "I think I'm falling asleep," he says.
"Then sleep."
"Don't want to..." He wants to go on talking to Tseng. Looking at Tseng. He's afraid this chance may never come again.
"How can you take care of your SOLDIERs, if you neglect yourself?"
You can take care of me, thinks Lazard dreamily.
He tries to force his eyes open, but they insist on closing. Through the veil of his lashes he sees Tseng move as if about to stand up, and puts out a hand to stop him. "No. Stay. Talk to me."
Tseng hesitates. Then he says, "If you like," and sits back down. Lazard can relax again. He thinks how funny it is, funny ironic, how all his life he's never felt entirely safe anywhere, not in the slums and not in Shin-Ra, but now, with a Turk in the room, he does.
"You're doing a good job, you know," says Tseng suddenly. "With your department. People have noticed."
"Exceeded - expectations, mm?" He's so close to sleep it's an effort to force the words out.
"In some quarters, perhaps." Not mine, is the implication. "I know those three can be difficult, especially Genesis, but they seem to respond to you. That's quite an achievement. Gibson never learn the knack of managing them. He didn't try to understand them. You do, I think. It probably helps that you're close in age."
He waits, but Lazard doesn't reply. He's breathing peacefully, lips slightly parted, a healthy flush on his cheeks
Tseng could have drugged him - he had the chance when he was in the kitchen, and he always carries a packet of dream powder in his inside breast pocket - but for once he's not guilty; this sleep is nature's doing.
Tseng reaches over to carefully remove Lazard's glasses, folds them, and lays them on the table, thinking how in sleep, with all his cares smoothed from his face, Lazard looks just like the boy he once was. He may not remember his assassin's face, but his failed assassin remembers him.
Commander Veld has decided that Rufus Shinra is the Company's best hope for the future, and Tseng is not in the habit of questioning his Commander's judgement. Rufus is all intellect, cold logic untainted by messy feelings. Whatever needs to be done, he will do it, remorselessly. Lazard, though intelligent enough, is ruled by his bleeding heart; Veld says his sentimentality will be his undoing. Veld, it's clear, doesn't care much for Lazard.
Tseng does care, though he wishes he didn't. It crept up on him: he can't help responding to the unShinra-like warmth of Lazard's heart, or admiring his dedication to his men. He thinks he and Lazard might, given half a chance, discover that they had much in common. After all, Veld often accuses him of sentimentalism too. And he feels guilty for this weakness where Lazard is concerned, for liking him, for being drawn to him, for regretting the might-have-been - as if by liking Lazard he is somehow tainting himself with the treason Lazard has not yet committed, but certainly will. Veld believes that if you give a traitor enough rope he will hang himself - which, of course, saves the Turks the trouble of fabricating evidence against him.
Tseng is aware that Lazard likes him too. In another world, that might have been enough. In this one, it's completely irrelevant.
Veld says that if you put a loaded gun in the hands of a man with a grudge, sooner or later he's going to use it. Lazard is that man, and SOLDIER is the gun Veld gave him. Veld talked the President into appointing his superfluous son as Head of SOLDIER because he believes that, sooner or later, the temptation to rebel will become more than Lazard can resist. His men may follow him, or they may not; it all depends where Angeal decides his loyalty lies. Veld is hoping that Angeal will side with Lazard; it will give the Turks the justification they need to shut down the SOLDIER program - and if SOLDIER falls, Hojo, the chief architect of the program, must fall with it, or at the very least be shaken to his foundations.
Hojo is Veld's ultimate target. Lazard - well, he's partly a tool, and partly collateral damage.
Tseng knows that eventually he will be called upon to finish the job he botched so badly twelve years ago, when he was thirteen and Lazard ten. He doesn't want to make that mission any more difficult for himself than it has to be. So he doesn't linger, but fetches a blanket from the linen cupboard and drapes it over Lazard's sleeping form; then he washes up the two cups and put them back in the cupboard, turns down the lights, and leaves.