• 1-Chrome

        He sat down heavily at the
back corner of the bar without a word.  Without so much as eye contact
with anyone.  He was not happy, to put things lightly.  He was
not... anything.  He was downright dangerous right now; more so than
usual.

        Instead of a regular "slightly
less than fresh" waitress coming to take his order with a smile on her
face and a pleasant giggle when she wandered away, the bartender himself
came over.  He was a stout man, not having worked in the place long
by the look of his clean fingernails.  Regardless, he knew a Turk
suit when he saw one.  And he made sure to come over personally, right
away.

        Smart decision. 
The Turk thought without looking over.  Had it been a happy bar girl...
she'd not have been happy around him for long.

        "What'll you have?" the
bartender asked in a low voice.

        Had the finely dressed man
actually looked up at him, he'd have seen the horrific fear across his
face.  He might have even laughed and gone back to his apartment fulfilled
and cheery, had things been different.  But this time was unlike anything
else or any other time in his life.  Without even looking at the guy
he announced sharply, "Scotch.  The bottle and a glass."

        He certainly must have sounded
impatient.  It really only seemed to take a small number of seconds
for his order to be placed in front of him.  Bottle, glass, no ice. 
That's how he liked it.  The startled bartender retreated without
a word or a check.

        He poured himself a shot
and swallowed it all right away.  That familiar burn... it had been
a while.  Quite a long while.  Not that he didn't drink some
of the finer wines and such every now and again (either after stealing
it or killing the owner of it), but he had no such intention tonight. 
Tonight in particular he planned to get sloshed out of his mind and probably
find himself in prison the next morning after beating the shit out of a
bunch of people.  It didn't matter.  This was bad.  This
needed to be quelled, right now.  This was a matter of the heart.

        He chuckled darkly and under
his breath at that thought, pouring himself another.  A matter
of the heart.  His mind spat bitterly.  Fucking heart. 
Fucking world.  Fucking... fucking slut.

        Is that what Lucretia really
was?  Just a dumb little slut like all the rest?

  &;&nb;     No.  Of course she
wasn't.  And that's why it hurt so fucking much to lose her. 
She was so... different.  Smart and pretty, kind but confident. 
So sweet, so dear.  She'd been so good to him, so gentle and understanding. 
And he'd lost her.  He had just, lost her.

        And to a useless fuck like
Hojo.  He took another shot and f the the glass against the nearest
wall.  No one made a sound or a motion when it shattered; no one was
left to see it.  Even the bartender himself had taken off, surrendering
the building and all of his wares.  Even a new bartender knew. 
Mr. Valentine and a bottle were never, ever to be taken lightly.

        Fuck the glass.  He'd
drink from the bottle like an unfit commoner.  Like what Shin-Ra told
him he was.  Like Hojo had said he was, not in those words,
but in that little smirk.  That satisfied smirk after Lucretia had
told him--

        Another deep, burning swallow. 
He knew better than anyone that drowning your sorrows didn't work. 
It didn't do anything but make you go around and act like a violent moron
until you got yourself killed, and all the better for it.  But damn
it was nice to drown this shit out just a few hours.  Great to let
a warm feeling of calm envelop you, artificial or otherwise.  It was
great right up until you were leaning over a bathtub or a toilet or whatever
the fuck you had to hold on to as you attempted to purge yourself "for
the last time".

        He pulled the standard issue
Turk pistol from the shoulder holster, clicked the safety off and laid
it carefully beside the bottle on the table.  It's not like anyone
wouldn't expect him to go shoot that son of a bitch.  Shoot him several
times in non-lethal places and make it hurt.  Make the mother fucker
beg. 
Maybe take out his little whore, too.

        That very thought made him
cringe.  He didn't even care for himself when he'd been drinking. 
Not that it mattered.

        He took another couple of
swigs, almost choking on the sheer size of them, and experimentally put
the pistol to his temple.  So this is what it feels like, huh? 
Softly, slowly, he pulled the hammer back with an expert thumb.  Edge
of death.  Edge of being.  How much of a coward would he be,
in the end?  How right would he prove that asshole?

        Something shimmered in the
corner of his vision.  Drunk or not, he was still a master of destruction;
he aimed directly for the moving object and shot.  At that very instant,
it was like time had ceased to move regularly, the vision before him lasting
straight into the nonexistent time of the world itself...

        He could see the bullet
move in little transparent waves, the seconds ticking like hours to days
to months.  That image in front of him was the calm, gleaming silver
of cold chrome.  Flesh so white against leather so black; day and
blinding night with hair of molten silver--

        He sat back, stunned. 
Obviously someone had put something in his drink.  Something making
him hallucinate.  Shaking his head and putting the pistol back on
the table, he stared blankly at the spot he'd thought hejustjust seen something
incredible moving within.  But there was nothing there.  A bullet
hole in the wall behind it, but certainly nothing there.  Nothing
like his vision.

        It was a man, he'd thought. 
Wait--was it?  Yes, it had to be.  The body, the muscle, the
facial structure...  But holy fuck was it a gorgeous man.  He
shook his head, knowing that the alcohol really was getting to him. 
Maybe it had been too long since he'd been drinking.  It had been
so real, like the man was actually there, smirking at him knowingly. 
Almost like Hojo had, but... it was so different.  Almost daring him
to come over and shoot him, hit him, touch him--

        He threw the entire bottle
into the wall and through where the vision had been, the shards and splatters
of scotch landing among the pieces of shot glass.  That, whatever
the hell it had been, was certainly a sign that he needed to stop drinking
for the night.  That man he'd seen, if he'd really seen anything at
all, sure as hell wasn't human.  Those eyes were silted and gleaming
like some demon or monster.  No man looked like that.  None ever
could.  It just... it had been so...  Hell, even he had
been attracted to that vision.  It was even more beautiful than Lucretia
had been...

        He stared back at the gun,
laying there on the table and staring back.  The barrel was still
hot, smelling of gunpowder and smoke.  And something else entirely,
something he was absolutely certain he was imagining.  Something very
familiar.  Hair and faint cologne, flesh and sex.  The same smell
when he and Lucretia--

        He raised his pistol throthrow against the wall as well.  But this time he paused.  A
gun wouldn't shatter.  No, it would probably fire and hit him in the
foot or something stupid like that.  Then he would really be
chastised and taken as a fool.  Instead, he calmly reinstated the
safety and put it back in the holster.  Stupid world, stupid g/i>&/i> 
He almost laughed.

        Sitting back and waiting
for the effects of the alcohol to allow him to wander back to his apartment
on the edge of the city, the image of that man would
not leave his
head.  No matter how many thoughts of violence or women he tried to
bring about to cover it up, to burn it out, that hallucination just kept
coming back to him.  Every time he successfully darkened the image
out, it would spark and light again.  What the fuck was wrong with
him that he was actually picturing this guy over and over again, that he
could not remove him from his mind?

        But he could not deny it. 
He, the notorious womanizer, the finest shot of all the Turks... was getting
a hard-on from an impossible drunk hallucination.  In a dark, dirty,
abandoned bar with glass on the fucking floor.

        Abandoned.  And he
was drunk.  He slowly glanced over at the entrance, just barely able
to make out that the bartender had locked the doors on his way out. 
He glanced back to the spot where he'd seen that vision... and slowly pulled
the zipper of his pants down.  No one had to know.  And even
if someone found him, no one would ever figure it out.  He was drunk. 
He'd just been heavily rejected.  He was greatly feared by the general
population.  He could do this without questions, even from Shin-Ra.

        For several minutes, he
fumbled with the button, then with his underwear as his fingers refused
to do exactly as he demanded.  Fuck this.  He decided,
standing up shakily and pulling his pants down in one clumsy shove. 
Kicking his shoes across the room, he removed everything altogethith ith
a little aid from the table catching him before he hit the ground. 
In this state of mind, the mechanics of his suit also escaped him. 
So, he simply tore the rest off knowing that he could sure as hell get
someone else to pay for another.

        Flopping back into his chair,
completely open and exposed to the air around him, he sighed raggedly. 
Not that he was ever an exhibitionist, but things just went a hell of a
lot more smoothly when he wasn't wearing anything.  Settling back,
he closed his eyes and allowed himself to picture that beautiful creature
that had flashed in front of him and began to stroke himself.

       What was it about this man that
appealed to him so much?  He almost had a Lucretia seabouabout him,
in his features.  He was unable to make sense anything of the sort
in his drunkenness, but it didn't matter.  He was already pretty fucking
close to the edge with just the sight of it in his mind's eye--

        He flinched, gasping, his
heart racing out of his chest.  He'd just let his other hand lightly
rest on his thigh, but for a moment there it had almost felt like someone
else's fingers.  Like that other man's fingers, cold and smooth--he
let himself moan aloud.  He pictured it clearly, the silver haired
cree kne kneeling in front of him without surrendering an ounce of pride;
without needing to, because he wanted this, too.

        The faster he stroked, the
more real this vision seemed under his clouded mind.  He could see
this gorgeous, cold metal man kneeling, placing his hand on the Turk's
thigh and wordlessly drawing his other hand around and over, licking his
pale lips ever so slightly in anticipation--

        He moaned again.  Fuck,
this was getting good.  Better than any other time he'd ever
jerked off in his life.  Eager and so delicious it was almost
painful.  He imagined the man before him taking him into his mouth
and swallowing--

        That dark part of his mind,
the one that came out with or without the help of alcohol in part thanks
to his brutal training, took over.  Instead of merely giving in to
the euphoria this act should be granting him, the image of the other man
in his head suddenly grinned and bit down; not enough to scar, but just
enough to let the razor-sharp fangs draw blood.

        Instead of reacting in disgust
at his own disturbing vision, he cried out and threw his head back, completely
losing himself.  He swore he could almost feel the lips, the heat
of breath, the tre ofe of his own blood...

        As his vision cleared and
his body came back to life from what felt like an intensive coma,
he noted far too calmly that that had just been the best fucking
orgasm of his life, and he had been picturing a man that
certainly could not exist.  He came with the knowledge that this would
not be the last time he'd picture this man.  And the inkling that
this was more than just a hallucination fantasy.

        Suddenly he wished he hadn't
smashed that bottle against the wall.