Zack “The Puppy” Fair. That name had probably fit him at some point or another, when he let his childish naivety guide him and cloud his vision of what was going on right in front of him.

But now? The title felt like a collar fitted too tight, like a leash pulled too hard. Suffocating. Zack wasn't Shinra's bright eyed, dumb, obedient little dog anymore. He was a stray, the type that snarled and barked when you got too close. Being on the run from the strongest, most ruthless military will do that to a man.

There had been a time where Zack had wanted to be a hero. He had wanted to make the world a better place, be a catalyst for change. He'd left his safe little town of Gongaga as nothing more than a boy with a dream. That had been the biggest mistake of his life.

All it earned him was death, loss, and too many towns he could never show his face in again.

Zack was a strong man, but even he had his limits. When he'd awoken after the fires in Nibleheim to find the town rebuilt, he knew something in his life was going to drastically shift. He knew that something was changing, and not for the better. He didn't expect it to be himself; the kind of person he was. He could handle being on the run, fighting for his life, and being on the brink of death.

But the aching loneliness of dragging his only companion, barely lucid, across Gaia? That had broken something in him. Something had irreparably shattered in his soul, like a hole he could never fill. He could no longer trust the average passerby, when half of them would sell him out, if given the chance, for the gil offered for his capture. Zack had wised up real quick, had learned the rules of the world for someone living outside of the law. That was when he stopped asking for help; instead, he started stealing, threatening, and doing whatever he had to keep himself and Cloud alive.

Trust wasn't something easily won from Zack anymore. Anyone could see it in the way he eyed strangers, the way his gaze searched dark corners like he expected something to jump out. Sure, he could put on a good act if he thought he might get something out of it, but that's all it was. An act.

The spirits he'd had in his youth, his propensity for dumb jokes and even dumber questions? That had been a sort of protective bubble. It made people feel relaxed around him, it made them think he was less of a threat than he could be. It was deflection; it kept him from having to face the uncomfortable truths of the world. But humor doesn't stop a bullet, and Zack had learned that lesson a hundred times over.

Now, he snaps like a beaten dog, bares his teeth and growls when others draw near. His bite is worse than his bark, and sometimes he itches to show as much. His final stand with Shinra had proven as much. A lot of people had died, and Zack couldn't say he was sorry for those he felled. He was supposed to die there too, after all. He thought he did, but the Lifestream wasn't ready for him.

Sometimes, he wished that it had been. Anything was better than wandering the deserts outside of Midgar, hungry and wounded and having lost the one person he was supposed to protect. Cloud was missing, and he had nothing to show for the struggle they had endured together. His Buster sword was gone, his only friend was gone. His only comfort was the fact that Shinra thought him dead.

He felt like he was. His body had mostly healed of the wounds he'd sustained, but the scars had yet to fade. Even his accelerated healing thanks to his exposure to mako wasn't enough to make these wounds disappear so easily. He was thinner than he had been even as a child, surviving on nothing but scraps and whatever he could find out here.

His slow trek across the desert was halted as he heard the sputtering of an engine behind him, then saw the beat-up pickup truck said sputtering belonged to cruising to a stop beside him. He was sure he looked pathetic, dragging himself along in the blistering heat by a large stick he'd found. But his hackles were raised, on guard immediately as he tried to parse just who was approaching him.