Room 504, Sunday Early Early Morning

[intraspective]

Ino knew she probably should've, you know, gone to grad. To congratulate people, to tease them (and radio definitely made it sound like there was something to tease them about), to ask what their plans were and…

To say goodbye to some of them just in case she didn't see them before they left…

Yeah. That would be why she hadn't made it to grad. She didn't want to say goodbye to anyone and, rather foolishly was clinging to the idea that if she didn't say it, then it wouldn't have to happen.

(It would. Fandom wasn't that kind.)

Funnily enough, having gone through it before didn't make this easier at all. It made it harder. So when Ino woke up at crazy early in the morning o'clock with that knowledge hanging over her and the fact that there was a brunch today (another chance to say goodbye, ugh), she promptly curled up closer against Zack, hid further under the blankets, and buried her face in the pillow.

No. Not happening. She was not going to deal with this today. No one could make her!

[For that boy she's using as a shield only, please!]

Comments

[intraspective]

She nibbled on her lip and thought about that.

"But a lot of them don't ever come back. And you never hear from them again."

[puppy_fair]

"And... if they do, you don't want to spend the rest of your life knowing that you never got to see them off and wish them all the best, do you?"

Zack knew this stuff. Zack had spent a lot of time, terrified that he would never see Angeal again. That the ShinRa army would get to him first. That he'd never be able to tell his friend that he was there for him.

... It hadn't worked out so well anyhow. But at least Angeal had known.

So, that was one. He hadn't had the same privilege with the rest of SOLDIER, when Genesis stole them all away.

[intraspective]

Her lips were pressed together to keep them from trembling. Ino didn't like that idea either.

"Sorry," she said softly, one hand tracing absent circles on his chest. "I'm being stupid. I know I have to say goodbye. I just... don't like endings."

And that sounded small and pathetic in her own ears. Everything ended, she knew that. Hadn't it been okay last year? She still had Romeo and Dojima-san and Reno.

The list of people she didn't have was longer, though.

[puppy_fair]

Zack wrapped his arms around her, pulling her a little more close, still.

There wasn't such a thing as close enough, when it came to conversations like this one.

"I'm still here," he offered. Which wasn't much, but... It was all he had. "I'm not going anywhere."

[intraspective]

"You're not allowed to go anywhere," she said, making absolutely no move to, well, move except to snuggle closer. "I'd follow you if you tried."

Which was--just was. Ino wasn't sure how far that would go, if it came down to it, but wrapped up in his arms and secure in her understanding of how strong he was and how weak he was all at the same time... it seemed okay to say that.

He was important to her.

[puppy_fair]

"You'd be welcome company," he said, smiling a bit more. "But from the look of things back home, I have my doubts that they'll be asking me back any time soon anyhow."

No new missions. Nothing. Nothing at all. Just a handful of things that he had left over from... before Modeoheim, and beyond that...

Sigh.

[intraspective]

"Don't you think that... makes a bit of sense?" she asked carefully. "They might be giving you a chance to get your feet back under you."

What she knew of ShinRa meant that didn't quite jive as highly likely but Ino wasn't going to rule out the possibility of strings being pulled somewhere to give him a break.

[puppy_fair]

Zack... shrugged a little. He could probably go for that, sure. Only, the last time he hadn't been called back for any assignments for weeks on end, it was because the majority of SOLDIER suddenly up and went missing.

He was allowed to worry.

"I guess so. And anyhow, I still have a few missions left over from... Before stuff. I can go and make sure that those have been seen to, right?"

[intraspective]

That took her a second before she lifted her head off of his chest just far enough to peer at him.

"You just said you weren't going anywhere."

[puppy_fair]

There was a pause, there, and then he blinked down at her.

"Yeah. But you just said you were coming along if I did."

See? It made sense, then, in Zack logic!

[intraspective]

She frowned a bit at that but couldn't exactly argue.

"I suppose," Ino said, sighing and laying her head back down.

Trying not to think about the fact that, really, she could already line the dots up and foresee herself in Midgar again. Ino didn't want to have Zack go alone.

Even if the idea of Midgar and Jenova tied her stomach up in knots.

[puppy_fair]

"I don't expect you to," Zack replied, quickly. "And as a 1st, I technically have the right to turn down missions, now, so I don't have to, either, really."

He was fussing again. Something had upset Ino. Something in what he had said.

"There was one I thought you would be interested in," he ventured. "Some monsters down in some caves... Maybe even a few mechs that have gone haywire. You never know down there, you know?"

[intraspective]

"You have to do your job," she scolded lightly, feeling warm at his response despite that. "And I said I'll go."

She'd just be... nauseous and high strung with pure terror.

Ino forced a bit of a smile on. "Mechs are weak against Thunder."

Which was Ino-speak for saying that, yes, she was listening to him and that didn't sound that bad. She could do a cave.

[puppy_fair]

"They are," Zack agreed, smiling faintly for a moment before that smile lapsed.

Hers... wasn't reaching her eyes.

"But there's still something bugging you about it."

[intraspective]

Ino wrinkled her nose at him.

This was what she got for letting people get to know her well enough to tell things like that.

"Nothing to do with you," she answered, knowing the odds of him being satisfied with that were... slim to non-existent.

[puppy_fair]

"But still something," he noted, and now he was frowning. "What is it?"

Because sometimes, asking flat-out was the only way to let her know that he wasn't about to let the subject drop until he knew.

[intraspective]

"I don't want to talk 'bout it," she said, keeping her voice level. "It's stupid."

Yes, Ino. Because it was totally stupid to be scared of the fact that the same evil entity who you'd been for a weekend was alive on his planet and, as far as she was aware, in the very building they slept in while there.

Stupid wasn't the right word for it.

[puppy_fair]

"So's sleeping outside in a garden for almost a month," Zack pointed out, raising an eyebrow. "I think I'd like to hear about it anyway, if it's all the same to you."

See. They could be stupid together.

[intraspective]

"That wasn't stupid," she retorted.

Then kind of... drooped in his hold. "I really don't want to talk 'bout it."

[puppy_fair]

Zack was thinking on this one, now. Long and hard. If she didn't want to talk about it, he couldn't make her. And then she would still be upset about something, and he would never know what it was, and so there was no way he could possibly ever fix it.

"Then I won't go back," he settled on. Because that was what had started this whole thing in the first place. "They won't miss me."

[intraspective]

Her head snapped up, Ino using her elbows to lever herself up enough to stare him in the eyes at that.

"What?"

[puppy_fair]

Zack shrugged.

"They aren't sending me any work, and something about me wanting to go back to do the work I do have is bugging you," he reasoned. "You don't want to talk about what it is, and I'm not going to force you, so I'll just stay here. Someone else can take my old missions. Probably Sephiroth, since there's hardly anyone else left."

Welcome to 'The Way Zack's Brain Works 101.' Every last syllable was brutally honest, and carefully picked out so that it fell in step perfectly before the next.

[intraspective]

Ino gaped at him.

He couldn't just not work. Just because of her.

"I..." She wasn't worth that. If he wasn't doing missions then he'd just get antsy and unhappy and it would be all her fault. Because he'd be saying no for her sake. "You can't do that Zack. Your work is important."

[puppy_fair]

He shrugged again, lightly, waving a hand in the air for a moment as though it was going to do all of his talking for him.

"So are you."

As important, yes, if not even more important than a job that had ultimately led him to kill his best friend.

[intraspective]

Her lips trembled and Ino forcibly stopped herself from saying she wasn't that important. She'd promised to try and let him treat her like his number one.

This was trying.

"Your work is important," she repeated, softly, staring down so she didn't have to look him in the eye. Tracing the curve of his cheek and down his neck with her eyes. "You shouldn't not go just because of me. I will go. I... I'm..."

Ino squeezed her eyes shut and made herself keep going even as her voice dropped to something of an uneven whisper. "I'm just s-scared. Of J-Jenova."

Stupid stupid stupid.

[puppy_fair]

And now, Zack was chewing on his lip.

"So am I." So it wasn't stupid. Not unless they were both being idiots right now. "I've never.... I've never seen her before, you know. Before here."

There was a long pause, then.

"Is it the whole world?"

[intraspective]

And he didn't know exactly what the world looked like when everything to do with her and The Planet had settled.

Ino swallowed. "I--I don't know."

There, she could try honesty.

"Midgar'll be hard."

As far as Ino knew that was where Jenova was.

[puppy_fair]

"Then we don't have to go to Midgar," Zack replied. "We can catch a portal to-" his mind raced for a moment, desperate to pick out a place that didn't have some sort of unpleasant or awkward connection to it. "-Rocket Town, and then take whatever missions I have handy that we can get to from there. I can report successful missions over the phone, too."

[intraspective]

That pried a bit of a genuine smile out of her. "I do want to see Rocket Town," Ino admitted. "But won't they find that strange of you? And I... don't want to avoid anything for--forever. Not if I'm going to the world already."

[puppy_fair]

Zack nodded a bit, smiling back.

"But does it really make any sense to stop in Midgar if we're going to need transit all the way over to another continent? I can reply to the assignment, tell them that I'll take these ones over here instead, and then save the company the gil it takes to fuel a helicopter from here to there."

And maybe he just didn't trust himself not to cause another helicopter crash.

But mostly the rest of it.

[intraspective]

She thought about that, studying him for a long moment.

"And then... maybe next time, try Midgar?"

[puppy_fair]

"Whenever you're ready," he replied. "I still have missions in the Icicle Area and Mideel and Wutai that I can take, I think. Until the company actually sends me something new, we don't have to go near Midgar. Not as long as we're still students here."

At least, he was pretty sure. Genesis was gone now, after all. He might swing by on his own, to visit people. Tseng, Cissnei, Aerith, Cloud, Kunsel. But beyond that? No real reason. Nothing official.

[intraspective]

"We've got a year," she said, and Ino was just going to lean forward and press a quick kiss to his lips. Good morning and all of that. "It won't take me that long to get over being scared."

Well. To get over being so scared that she avoided the place. Ino didn't think she'd ever stop being scared of Jenova.

[puppy_fair]

"We've got a year," Zack agreed, leaning up a little because a quick kiss was nice, but it was quick, which was pretty much the entire problem with quick anything, wasn't it? And he would very much like another. "And then we can go from there."

[intraspective]

Well, if he was going to be that way then she could give him another, longer kiss. "I don't want to think about next year," Ino said, "because that means more things will change."

And next year, it would be their turn.

[puppy_fair]

And the prospect of them getting a turn was huge and exciting and maybe a little scary, somehow.

"Then let's focus on this year, first," he said, smiling up at her. "It's closer, anyhow."

[intraspective]

And safer, somehow.

In Fandom, things had rounded corners where they'd bite and scar and hurt in other worlds. "This year," she echoed, "and staying 'round."