A/N: Well, here's my first published attempt at fan fiction. Eek. It started out as a thought experiment and an exercise in writing first person, then grew, and grew, and grew, until it gained a life of its own and began to take the shape of a complete story. Let's see where it leads, shall we?

Rated T for threatening situations, violence and foul language.

Update, Aug 7 2015: Now that twenty chapters have been posted, I can provide a more detailed summary for new readers. This story is a behind-the-scenes view into Shinra, as seen by someone who was never meant to be there at all, set a little before and during FF7. It's a slow-burning tale about disillusioned, damaged people trying to come to terms with consequences, of the actions of others as well as their own. Over time, friendships form and grow, some more unlikely than others. Character-driven, in other words, but with an overarching plot.

The rest of the story has been plotted and just needs a bit more fleshing out, so unless I suddenly keel over dead, it will be finished. Hooray!

My eyes open, slowly, painfully, and are greeted by a gray floor. I lie still, staring ahead. Everything is silent. Nothing moves. The floor is cold.

Nothing moves, but I should move. Someone's after me. I don't know who, or why. I should know, but I don't. It doesn't matter now. I must move.

My gaze creeps further along the floor, until it meets an edge. A door. I climb the door with my eyes, drawn to the strange light emitted from its window. Up, past the round handle and tilted warning stripes, pausing by the metal sign just below the bright rectangle. I squint, forcing my eyes to focus. One by one, the letters enter my consciousness.

J-E-N-O-V-A

The letters mean nothing to me. The bright light hurts my eyes. I turn my head and it feels as if I'm moving through molasses. It takes so much effort. I see shapes and silhouettes around me, but little else. I stared into the brightness for too long and now it has blinded me.

I should move. I can't let them catch me.

I cry out when my side lights up with searing fire as I roll over. I must ignore it. I must move. More strangled sounds escape through my lips as I push myself up on all fours, but then I have to stop. My arms are shaking. My head aches, and feels so heavy.

Move!

There is something wrong with my eyes. The view is blurry, and the edges grow dim. It seems to be swaying, too. I press my eyes shut and take a deep breath to fight a sudden bout of nausea. I wince. Breathing hurts.

I open them again, only to find my vision is darker still. No, wait, there's someone here. A body obscures the light; a towering mass of physical darkness. I look up, craning my head to take in all of the impossibly tall figure. When my neck feels like it's about to break, the blackness retreats into two distinct blotches over a lighter-colored roundness.

It's a face, I realize. A face covered by dark glasses. I frown, confused. It doesn't make any sense. It's too dark in here for sunglasses.

"Don't move," a deep, gravelly voice rumbles. The face moves and I realize it's the one speaking the words, even if the lips appear to move out of synch. "Don't resist."

The face disappears and I am surprised to see the floor rush up against me. Then, there is nothing.

My head reverberated with a dull pounding that grew more and more insistent. I pressed my eyelids together tighter, hoping to return to blissful sleep, but it was futile. My ailing head saw to that.

I had to be alive. I didn't know how that could be possible, but a dead body doesn't feel pain. Somehow, I had survived.

Encouraged by this thought, I opened my eyes only to squeeze them shut again with a groan when light assaulted my senses and flung the headache onto a whole new level of misery. Gingerly, I tried again, blinking and squinting against the brightness.

As I attempted to take in my surroundings, the rest of my body made its discomfort known. Every muscle in my body ached; the ones in my neck responded with an intense burning when I tried to move my head. I let it loll down against my chest with a soft moan. While I waited for my eyes to adjust, I absently studied the scuffed red and black alloy plate protecting the upper half of my torso. Wherever I was, I still had my hazard suit. That was some comfort.

Once my eyes were cooperating, I gave the small room a cursory examination. Nondescript, gray walls. A simple metal table. Two chairs, equally plain. A large mirror covered most of the back wall, revealing my seated form in a third, much sturdier chair. I grimaced. My head looked as battered as my old protective suit.

As I tried to get up, I realized something else. I was tied to the chair, which, in turn, was bolted to the floor. Wide, metal straps trapped my wrists and ankles. I tested their durability, using up more and more of the suit's strength-boosting system until the servos began to whine, but it was no use. The binds were unshakable.

Don't panic. Use your head.

My hazy eyes scanned the room a second time. It looked an awful lot like an interrogation room. I turned my attention back to the large mirror on the wall and narrowed my eyes. Someone had to be behind that mirror. I was being watched.

I craned my neck and tried to twist my body around to look behind me, but an intense pain flared up in my left side. My mouth fell open in a silent scream. My chest seized, paralyzing my breathing for several agonizing seconds, and then I slumped back into the chair like a ragdoll, gasping for air.

Once I had recovered enough to be able to think again, I frowned. This was worse than mere sore muscles. Disjointed, fuzzy memories of an explosion returned to me. I remembered the strange weightlessness as I sailed through the air, then the unforgiving solidity of the ground as I landed hard; hard enough to crack the visor of my helmet, though fortunately not my skull. The suit had absorbed most of the impact, but not all of it. I must have been too high on adrenaline to notice at the time.

"Suit," I croaked, then had to stop before the tickling in my dry throat made me cough. I cleared my throat and tried again, a little alarmed by how weak my voice was. "Suit, check user status."

I closed my eyes as the electronic voice began to list my injuries, finding it difficult to pay attention to the sound.

"Warning. Vital signs critical. Head injury detected. Internal bleeding detected. Seek immediate medical attention."

I groaned. This was bad. This was very, very bad. Once again, I struggled against my binds, trying to break free.

"Warning. Power at ten percent."

Correction: the situation had just gone from very bad to worse.

Once the batteries were drained, I wouldn't be able to move, considering the state I was in. It might be impossible to even get the suit off on my own. I could feel my resolve begin to crumble along with hope. Had I really survived just so I could slowly bleed to death while strapped to a fucking chair?

Come on! Use that damned brain of yours. Start with the facts.

I was trying, I really was, but my mind was growing more and more sluggish with every second, while the facts flitted about like butterflies on a meadow. The bloody things were practically frolicking as they danced further and further away from my reach.

I had to close my eyes again as the world began to sway at the edges of my view. The physical exertion to free myself had been too much. The ache in my head took over my senses, numbing them with its steady beat, yet at the same time felt somehow duller with every second. My consciousness was slipping away, I realized. I was going to pass out again.

"Hey! Wake up!"

A male voice nearby startled me. With great effort, I forced my eyes open, but that was the best I could manage. My head was too heavy; I couldn't lift it.

There was movement in my field of vision. I thought I could make out a pair of dark boots come to a halt before me, but I couldn't be sure. It was hard to concentrate.

"Yo!" Fingers snapped a few times in front of my face. "Hey, can ya hear me?"

I tried to look up at his face, but failed. As my unfocused gaze swayed back and forth over the blurry floor in front of me, I noticed that everything moved with a slight delay, as if I was watching the world in slow motion. My head felt so heavy. It began to droop forward again.

"Shit, she's no use to us like this. Let's get some of the good stuff in her."

The voice was distant now, I could barely make out the words. A large hand grabbed my chin, tilting my face upwards. My vision was going dark, but I got the impression of a face with dark shapes covering the eyes. For some reason, the situation felt eerily familiar. Moments later a sickly sweet, cool liquid trickled down my throat. I swallowed, then coughed when the viscous fluid threatened to go the wrong way. The next second I was gasping and seizing up again, while bright hot pain squeezed my bruised ribs.

As the pain began to fade, I became aware of a tingling sensation in my stomach. It started out faint, but quickly grew stronger as it spread over my torso and down my limbs. My jaw clenched tight and my back arched again as the unusual feeling intensified into something unbearable. However, in the blink of an eye it was gone. Stranger still, it took the pain with it. I blinked repeatedly, stunned and confused. My vision was returning. My head felt clearer, too.

"Hey, you with us now?"

Now that my senses had returned, the voice was gratingly loud. Its owner was the young man who was peering at my face with a pair of bright blue eyes.

No, not quite blue. There was a greenish tint to them. Teal? Was that the word? Aquamarine, maybe?

"Yeah? You there now?"

The question interrupted the short-lived and rather embarrassing fascination with the man's unusual eye color. The dense fog had lifted, but my mind was still dazed, struggling to comprehend what had just happened. They must have given me some kind of instant pain relief, but I had never heard of oral medication with such a rapid effect.

I tried to blink away the grogginess a few times and nodded slowly, careful not to trigger the return of that awful headache. The man straightened up, allowing me to take a proper look at him. The first thing that drew my attention was the hair; a wild, spiky mess in vivid scarlet, pushed out of his eyes with the aid of a pair of goggles. Two curved lines on his cheekbones, in a red hue matching the hair, framed the outer corners of his eyes.

The redhead was wearing a dark suit, but the fact that it looked a size or two too big diminished the overall impression, not to mention the partially buttoned white shirt and lack of a tie. He was slouching with his hands stuffed into his trouser pockets, completing the laid back look.

"Right. Let's get this show on the road, eh?"

His speech matched his sloppy appearance. Despite extensive exposure to different kinds of accents and dialects over the years, I had trouble understanding his lazy pronunciation.

He sauntered over to my side, eyeing me with mild curiousity. Only now did I notice the other man in the room. The burly man had been standing still, obscured by the redhead, and hadn't said a thing as far as I could tell. Unlike the other one, this man wore his suit with impeccable style, complete with tie. His eyes were hidden by dark glasses, while the rest of his face betrayed no emotion.

I recognized him, I realized. My recent memories were hazy and I couldn't place him, but I was sure I'd seen him before.

As the brain fog receded, I became aware of the fact that I was still strapped to a chair and that these two men had made no move to free me. The confusion grew stronger.

"Get me out of this chair," I pleaded. "Please. I'm injured."

"We took care of it already," the redhead drawled with casual indifference. "It ain't perfect, but you'll be fine, yo."

He waltzed back to stand in front of me and bent forward at the hip until his face was level with mine, his hands still in his pockets. A crooked smirk appeared on his face and I felt my muscles grow tense. That wasn't a friendly smile.

"That is... You'll be fine as long as you play nice and do as you're told, darlin'. We have questions. You're gonna answer 'em."

A/N: The hazard suit is heavily inspired by the HEV suit from Half-Life, but otherwise there is no connection with that universe. This isn't a crossover fic.