sleazeoverstyle

For years now, he's been the kind of guy to sleep with one eye open. He doesn't trust anyone, sleeps with a weapon in reach, even after a night like the one he and Sin had and it ain't nothin' against her. It's just how he's wired. That don't mean he doesn't wake up with his arm thrown over her, the warmth of her skin seeping in. She's friggin' fun, and he knew he wasn't gonna regret it.

Fuck no. She's got this thing in her tongue that's just... yeah, the memory of it makes him smile right into his pillow.

He might not be much for lyin' around, but he ain't quite ready to get out of bed yet.

In Midgar, April 8 is just your friggin' run-of-the-mill day. There ain't nothin' special about it at all, just like there ain't a fuck of a lot special about the city itself no more. Yeah, yeah, so he destroyed one of the city's sectors a few years ago without help, without remorse, without any of that shit. So what? It was just part of his job. Yeah, yeah, so thousands of people died. Kids. Families. Dogs and cats. Businesses ruined. Fuck it: they were the slums anyhow. Some days he's surprised he can still walk around his home town without gettin' shot at or knifed like his brother or that someone ain't stuffed a bomb in his helicopter or nothin', but they ain't done that and not a whole lot of people know it was him anyway. And all those people were gonna die anyhow, sooner or later. It was just their day.

That's what he tells himself anyhow. And it was a couple years ago and he tries not to think about all the damage a guy can cause just by followin' orders and puttin' his friggin' finger on a little red button. He'll never let on that's what he thinks about every friggin' day when he walks around this city of his, or that he had this little tiny ulterior motive for being the one to do it. He friggin' hated Sector 7, and he had his reasons.

None of 'em have shit to do with the cute-as-a-button lady at his side, and if he was any kind of a gentleman at all -- he ain't -- he'd be amused and happy at the wide-eyed innocence she's got written all over her face right now. Shit, a guy would think she never saw a city before a single day in her life. Maybe he ought to give this gentleman shit a nod. That'd be cool.

Wait! What the hell is he sayin'? That was close: he almost lost it there for a second.

"So. Chuck. Just another block till we get to my place. What do you think of the city so far?" Her pack's hangin' off his shoulder. He might not be a gentleman but he ain't asshat enough to make her carry her own shit around his city. "You see anything you want, let me know." His pockets are full of cash and he even cleaned his whole apartment in a way he didn't even do for Lara when he brought her here. Nah, he likes Charlie too much to do a half-assed job of it.

Besides, there might be pie.

"You ready? Belted in?" It's still pre-dawn up here on the top of the Shin-Ra building's Midgar office, but the hum of rotors and engine fill the air. He puts a hand over one ear to cover the headphone and speaks into the small microphone. Shin-Ra Three, ready for takeoff. There's a pause when the only thing that makes noise is the voice talkin' in his ear and the sound of the blades whirring.

Shin-Ra Three, you are cleared for departure.

"Shin-Ra Three departing." Shit, he could do this in his sleep. And considering how little sleep they got last night he practically is, but he's good at this. He's been piloting helicopters since he was seventeen, and he knows what he's doing so he ain't concerned in the least as the helicopter lifts and hovers over the city of Midgar in the last of the night's darkness. To the east, the sun's just starting to rise and they should be approaching the crater at the perfect time. Yeah, there's somethin' to be said for a guy who knows what he's doing.

Once they're off the roof and over the city heading north, he turns to Lara, who's got her own set of headphones on. Noise reduction's a necessary evil in these things and he may want to be a charming old drunk some day, but he wants to be a hearing charming old drunk. But he switches over to the chopper's inside microphone.

"Hey. Pretty lady. How do you like the view so far? Besides dark? Check this out." He swings the chopper around in a wide arc; in front of them now, the first rays of the morning sun peek out over the mountains.

It's a view he never gets tired of seein', and he hopes like fuck he never, ever does.