Desha's Reno of the Turks Fan Fiction

Chapter 43: The End of the Beginning

Elena tugged gently at the handcuffs that held her in place. They weren’t overly tight, but looped as they were around that bar, she wasn’t going anywhere… Her captor had wisely removed anything nearby that might have let her pick them.

Speaking of her captor…

He was dozing now, eyes closed, face slack, with his head resting on one arm. She didn’t want to risk rousing him just yet… but getting out of those cuffs without doing so wasn’t going to be easy. Maybe if she just bent her thumb in a little bit more and pulled…

The chain slipped against the bar with a metallic clatter that was unbearably loud to her ears in the silent room.

“If ya wanted ’em off, ya coulda just said so…” a voice taunted her, and she turned her head. Clear, blue eyes stared back at her, holding her gaze for a few seconds before roving greedily over her body. She laughed softly.

“I was trying not to disturb you…”

Reno grinned and moved closer, pressing himself to her side and letting his fingers trail over her bare skin. “Disturb me? If it means I get to stare at you for awhile, I’d rather be awake. ‘Sides… I wasn’t really sleepin’ anyway.”

“Could’ve fooled me,” she snickered. He’d certainly looked like he was asleep. “But since you’re awake…” Her eyes flicked suggestively towards the handcuffs that bound her to the headboard. The redhead smirked, and walked his fingertips slowly along her abdomen. The rookie shivered slightly at the ticklish sensation.

“What’s in it for me?”

“Not getting in trouble for being late back from lunch, for starters…” she pointed out, “Which, we’re going to be, if we don’t get out of here pretty soon.”

“What’s that sayin’ about all work ‘n no play… ?”

“What’s that saying about too much of a good thing… ?” she countered, giggling softly.

“Heh… You are one thing I definitely don’t mind over-indulging in…” he replied, burying his face against her throat and lavishing it with tender kisses that gradually began to spread over to her shoulder and then up along one of the arms that was tethered to the bed. Against her better judgment, Elena let her eyes close, enjoying his attention. She gasped softly as his hand caressed her inner thigh.

Well… maybe they could be just a little late getting back to the office…

She was actually on the verge of thinking up legitimate excuses for having taken so long when the moment was spoiled by the insistent ringing of a PHS. Reno audibly groaned and pulled away from her, leaving her frustrated and still craving his touch.

“Remind me to kill him when we get back,” he muttered, annoyed, before accepting the call. “Yeah, boss?” He paused, listening to whatever request was being made of them. “Yep… On our way back now.” Reno tossed the phone back into the pile of clothes next to the bed, and sighed, casting her an apologetic look. “So much for round two…”

“Is anything wrong?” Elena asked, sitting up slightly, as Reno retrieved the keys to her handcuffs and dutifully released her. He shook his head.

“Nah… Tseng just unexpectedly found some free time this afternoon. He wants to work in an extra training session with ya.”

The rookie was a suddenly feeling a little torn. She was starting to enjoy the new training. On the other hand… they hadn’t had much in the way of private time in nearly two weeks. And she was pretty sure that Reno held a lot more potential for fun than materia offered…

The redhead suddenly laughed, and handed her clothes to her. “Don’t look so disappointed, ‘Lena… We can pick this up later tonight.”

“I already told you,” she said, dressing quickly, “Not while Nana and Del are staying with us.”

“What if we’re real quiet?” he teased.

“You’re never that quiet.”

He snickered. “Yeah… ’cause it’s all me makin’ noise. Remind me. Which one of us was flat out screamin’ my name a little while ago?”

“I was not screaming,” the rookie scoffed. Reno smirked, and calmly started buttoning his shirt.

“Trust me… You were screamin’.”

“Just for that, next time, you’re wearing the handcuffs… We’ll just see who’s screaming about what.”

Reno grinned wickedly. “That a promise?”

---

Rude frowned as he read through another report. This was the third confirmation he’d gotten in less than eight hours… and the first had been from a reliable enough source that he’d already been deeply concerned before the others had even started rolling in.. If his informants were right about this, they had a day. Maybe two. Or maybe less.

Avalanche. Up until recently, they’d been little more than a side-thought. But with their acquisition of a self-professed former Soldier… who’s identity Rude was still struggling to verify – though he did at least have a name to work with now… their potential threat had increased rather drastically. And now it seemed they were ready to move. Three sets of eyes and ears in the Sector 7 slums were reporting that their first real attack on Shinra was imminent.

He’d already ventured down earlier to investigate personally. The Seventh Heaven had been empty save for its bartender and a handful of early morning drunks… which made him wonder if the group had a secondary location in addition to the bar. Nothing of the sort had ever made it into any of his intelligence reports, but that was something that easily could have slipped through the cracks… particularly given how small the group was. As far as he’d been able to determine, its membership numbered somewhere between five and eight. There were one or two individuals he wasn’t quite certain were anything more than sympathizers. Something that small was easy to hide.

What the target was, and how they planned to attack was equally unknown… though a portion of a shipment of explosives bound for a construction project had come up missing a few weeks ago. Urban Development had written it off as nothing more than a clerical error, but Rude hadn’t been quite so willing to dismiss it as such. He had tagged the incident report as possibly being of interest, but there wasn’t a lot to go on, so it had simply been noted and filed away for whenever he might have need of the information.

“Is there anything new?”

“Just more people telling me its going to happen soon,” Rude replied, spinning his chair slightly to face the Wutaiian Turk that had suddenly materialized behind him. Tseng frowned.

“Nothing to indicate a target?”

Rude shook his head and turned back to the computer screen. “Not yet. But it would almost certainly be a reactor. We’ve suspected that for months.”

“That still only gives us a one in eight chance of choosing the right one to keep an eye on. Alert reactor security, and do what you can to narrow it down.”

“On it.”

Tseng nodded and returned to his own little corner of the office. He was beginning to think it had been a mistake letting Avalanche run around loose in the slums. Granted, they hadn’t identified all of the members, but they could have dealt with some of them a long time ago if he’d only pushed a bit harder for permission to do so. At the time, though, they hadn’t been certain if they’d have been cutting off the head or the tail… and getting that wrong would only have driven them deeper underground.

So they had waited. And watched. Movements were tracked, targets had been studied. At this point, they knew with a fair amount of certainty who was in charge, at least of the cell in Sector 7. It was really more a matter of not knowing who else might have been in play and whether or not there were cells in other sectors that had kept the Turks from acting.

And then there was the new recruit. Cloud Strife, or at least that was the name one of Rude’s more reliable informants had passed along to them. He claimed to be ex-Soldier, but there was no record of him in Soldier’s files. There was no record of him in the general military’s files either… save one very brief mention of a ‘C. Strafe, Private’ in connection with the Nibelheim incident five years ago – though he had no particular reason to believe the reference might have been a typographical error, beyond gut instinct.

If he was, in fact, connected to Nibelheim, then it was entirely possible that President Shinra had ordered the army to erase any record of his existence. That single entry might very well only still be on record because of a spelling error. Only a handful of people in the company even knew about the coverup. Some of the executive board hadn’t even been informed. Tseng knew, perhaps, more than he really should have…

The Turks had been along for the clean-up detail afterwards. It had been one of his earliest assignments as head of the Turks, and he’d seen to it personally along with his newly minted lieutenant. The immediate aftermath had been nothing short of horrifying. Many villagers had burned alive in their homes or in the streets, and others, who were unfortunate enough to cross his path, were violently murdered by the legendary Sephiroth… even Shinra’s own personnel hadn’t been spared. It was hard to believe that so much destruction had been wrought by one man.

Officially, nothing had happened in Nibelheim five years ago. To admit otherwise would have been a PR nightmare for the company. The Turks had handled security until the ruins had been razed, and then the entire town had been rebuilt in secret from the ground up exactly as it had been before. Shinra had even installed its own personnel and their families to inhabit the town. Short of having been born and raised there, no one would ever have known anything was amiss.

Unofficially, however, was another matter. There had been survivors. Not many, but a few. Those that wouldn’t go along with the ruse quietly disappeared, courtesy of the Turks. There had been two other survivors, not from the town’s population, as well. One, a young man Tseng had known personally… a Soldier, First Class, by the name of Zack Fair. He’d met him, in part, through Aerith. The other was only a boy, serving as a member of Shinra’s ground troops. Tseng had never known his name, or what had happened to him. Hojo had ultimately taken charge of both of them. He never saw either of them again.

Zack, he knew, was officially listed as killed in action… though he also knew that to be false. Zack Fair was most certainly dead… but his death had been far more recent. Whatever experiments Hojo was using him for, he’d apparently found an opportunity, six months ago, to escape. Shinra troops and Soldier had cornered him not far from Midgar and executed him… a fact that he technically wasn’t supposed to be aware of, but Heidegger had a habit of shouting rather loudly when he was annoyed. His voice tended to carry, even with his office door closed.

As to the boy… Tseng had no way of knowing if he was alive or dead. The incident had been left in the hands of Soldier, not the Turks. If he was still alive, though… Tseng couldn’t help but wonder if perhaps he was this mysterious “ex-Soldier” Avalanche had recruited.

He shook his head. Admittedly, it was a longshot, and it was very likely that he was grasping at straws. Both Zack and the boy had been gravely injured in Nibelhiem. He was surprised, to put it mildly, when he’d learned that Zack had survived. The other young man had more than likely succumbed to his injuries years ago… He doubted even Hojo would have been able to do anything for him.

Still… the possibility nagged at him. The timing of Zack’s reappearance and the arrival of the ex-Soldier was just a little too convenient to ignore.

---

“Cut it out,” Elena giggled, swatting at the body behind her. Reno’s arms were wrapped snugly around her waist as he teasingly kissed and nuzzled the back of her neck. “Someone’s going to see us!”

One arm untangled itself and reached out, tapping the emergency stop button on the elevator panel. The car came to an abrupt halt.

“Problem solved,” he murmured against her skin.

“Reno!” The sudden realization that there were security cameras in all of the elevators was almost enough to make her panic. An emergency stop would trigger an alert. An alert would mean that building security would pull up the camera feed. And that meant that there was almost certainly someone watching as the redhead unapologetically nibbled on her ear. She heard him laugh, the soft tremors of it vibrating gently against her back. He pulled away and jabbed at the button again, sending them upwards again.

“Alright, alright… I’ll behave,” he said, grinning at her. “But can ya blame me? I have the most beautiful woman on the planet, and I can barely steal an hour alone with her lately.”

Elena rolled her eyes. The redhead was starting to make a habit of referring to her like that lately… It was sweet, certainly, but so overly dramatic. Apparently, he noticed her reaction.

“What? You are. Beautiful, I mean.”

She smirked slightly. “You’ve already won me over, Reno. You don’t have to keep flattering me every chance you get.”

“Who says it’s flattery?”

“The ‘most beautiful woman in the world’?” she dryly retorted.

“… You are to me, ‘Lena,” Reno replied, sincerity in his voice, before flashing her a teasing smile, “And if you think resistin’ that kinda temptation day after day is easy, you’re also completely nuts…”

“It’s only for a few more days,” she pointed out, laughing. “Nana and Del will be heading home on Sunday… and then we’ll have the apartment all to ourselves again.”

“So… basically, I can have Nana, or I can have sex. I can’t have both,” he sighed.

Elena blinked. “Reno… I know what you meant, but that was a mental image I really didn’t need,” she said, as the elevator doors slid open, depositing them on the Turks’ floor.

“Should I even ask?” Tseng’s voice queried, and the rookie jumped slightly, not having expected him to be waiting for them.

Reno opened his mouth to respond, but Elena just as quickly cut him off.

“Please don’t, sir…”

The Turk leader chuckled softly.

“In that case… If you’re ready?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You gonna need me for this, boss?” Reno asked, looking somewhat hopeful, but still resigned to his fate. Over the course of the week, the redhead had been frozen, shocked, saturated and briefly buried alive as Elena had made her way through a litany of low-level elemental spells. The only thing Tseng hadn’t allowed her to try on him had been a fire spell… though she wasn’t particularly upset about it. Even at low power, she’d burned several stationary targets to cinders. She didn’t want to think about what fire materia could do to human flesh.

She wasn’t even sure she wanted to continue practicing with it, as she had no intention of ever using it in a fight. Killing a person, quick and clean, with a bullet to the head was one thing. Watching someone burn to death was something didn’t think she ever wanted to see… or be responsible for.

“Not today,” the Turk leader replied. “We’re going to be working on defense. Elena will be blocking and nullifying my attacks this time.”

Reno smirked. “Oh… Good. You’re gonna torture her for a change.”

“I do, however, need you to assist Rude. Avalanche is moving again… and I’m officially putting us all on a level two alert, effective immediately.”

“Tch… Those assholes again?”

Tseng nodded. “It seems they’re getting ready to act upon whatever it is they’ve been planning. I would prefer they be dealt with before they can do so.”

“Understood,” Reno replied, taking on a more serious tone. “You want it to be public? Make an example of ’em?”

“No. Try to do it quietly. The less attention drawn, the better, I think.”

“Got it. We’ll take care of it,” the redhead said, “Heh… and don’t break my girlfriend while we’re gone.” He leaned over and kissed Elena goodbye before disappearing into the main office.

“Hmph… His mood never fails to improve after lunch. Where exactly did the two of you go, anyway? Anything I might like?” Tseng commented offhandedly, ushering Elena back into the elevator.

The rookie flushed bright red. “U-um… We…” She really hadn’t thought anyone would ask… She was terrible at making things up on the fly, and even if she weren’t, she didn’t like the idea of lying to Tseng. But on the other hand, the rookie really wasn’t about to explain to her superior that the two of them had just spent the last hour at a little motel a few blocks from headquarters, either…

The Turk leader cocked an eyebrow and shook his head, chuckling in realization. “Ah. Nevermind. I’m probably better off not knowing the details.”

---

Reno trailed his partner through the back alleys of the Sector 7 slums. Thus far, they’d turned up nothing, in spite of meeting with several of Rude’s people. The train stations, likewise, had been a dead end. No one had seen anyone matching the descriptions of the terrorist group… and given that one of them had a rather large gun surgically grafted onto his arm, that was saying something. It was as if they’d simply vanished.

Really, it wasn’t that hard to do exactly that down here. For all they knew, Avalanche might have moved on to another sector entirely by now… though for what it was worth, Rude didn’t seem to think so, and Reno had long ago learned to trust him in matters of intelligence. But if they were still here, they’d found one hell of a deep hole to crawl into.

“Tseng’s not gonna be happy, partner… He wanted this taken care of, ASAP.”

“… I know.”

“Come on, man… Don’t get like that. Not your fault. We’ve been sittin’ on this for almost a year now. Boss shoulda just dealt with ’em soon as they popped up on the radar, no matter what Heidegger said…”

Heidegger was only part of the problem… but as usual, he was a large part. While he hadn’t expressly forbidden the Turks from simply exterminating the pests, he’d been dicking around on actually ordering an operation to do so. The Turks may have been largely autonomous, but mass murder wasn’t something they could just decide to do on the spur of the moment. Tseng could probably have justified it, even without getting the go-ahead from his boss… but there was a certain amount of politics inherent in his position. Heidegger was already of a mind not to do them much in the way of favors… going behind his back, even for the good of the company, wouldn’t have helped that. Particularly when they needed to go behind his back for other reasons without having to worry too much about the fallout.

“We’re running out of places to look.”

“Could always check the bar again…”

Rude shook his head. “Already been in there once today. Bartender’s not stupid. I keep turning up and she’s gonna know that we know something’s going on.”

“So I’ll go alone,” Reno said, shrugging. “She hasn’t seen me in… hell, I haven’t been in there since she threw me the fuck out. Probably won’t even recognize me after so long…”

The other Turk snickered softly. “Ten gil says otherwise. I’ll meet you at the weapons shop down the street when you’re done,” his partner said with a nod.

Reno headed towards the little bar, making sure his weapons were well out of sight before pushing the door open and walking in. For a dive in the slums, he had to admit… the place was nice. The chick that ran it kept it clean… both in terms of the general environment and the clientele.

The first thing that caught his eye was the little girl behind the counter… who seemed to be unusually comfortable with the shaker clasped in her hands. Not that he had any room to talk, given that he’d started over at the Lonely Dragon when he was eleven… but the kid looked like she was barely out of diapers. Couldn’t possibly have been older than five or so…

Then again… If you couldn’t get a babysitter, why not bring your kid to work? Probably, he mused, she was just playing around, anyway. He doubted there was anything more than water and ice in that shaker.

“You!” a voice suddenly accosted him from across the bar, and Reno cringed. That wasn’t exactly a welcoming tone… “I thought I told you never to come back!”

The woman was headed straight for him, and she didn’t look happy to see him. The redhead slowly raised his hands in a placating gesture, hoping to avoid any violence. So much for not being recognized. The bartender stopped mere inches away from him.

“Get out,” she said, pointing to the door.

“Hey, come on, now… I’m not lookin’ for trouble,” Reno replied, flashing her his most charming grin. Mentally, he groaned. It just figured… This might not go quite as smoothly as he’d assumed it would.

“Then go somewhere else before you find it. You’ve got a lot of nerve coming back here… That fight you started destroyed more than half my inventory.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa… I didn’t start anything, lady. That asshat hit me first.” Granted, he’d hit him because Reno had been unabashedly ogling his date from across the bar at the time. And maybe he’d gone just a touch too far when he’d tossed him into the stock behind the counter… but still…

“Get. Out,” she repeated, “Or I’ll throw you out. Again.”

The place was mostly empty. One guy passed out over a bottle in the corner, and two more sitting at the bar who looked like they were taking bets on who was going to throw the first punch. No sign of anything Avalanche-related. Of course there was always the back room… though from his admittedly limited point of view, it looked just as empty as the bar. It might still be wise to subtly check it out, though. But first he’d have to smooth things over with the bartender.

“Listen… I didn’t come in to start anything. I just came in for dri–INK!” Reno’s voice cracked like a thirteen year old boy’s and his eyes went wide as the woman’s hand shot out and clenched around an entirely too sensitive portion of his anatomy. He’d expected some resistance on her part, but he hadn’t been prepared for that… “Ah, fuck! Okay… okay…” he ground out, “I can see we kinda got off on the wrong foot here…”

He wasn’t sure if he should try shake her off, or just hope to Ifrit she wasn’t as pissed off as she looked at the moment. He certainly hadn’t come in here with the goal of hurting her… but if she was going to keep this up, Reno wasn’t about to hold back defending himself.

She forced him back, towards the door, her hand still between his legs. He yelped in pain when her grip suddenly tightened.

“Alright, I’m goin’!”

In one swift movement, she released him, and shoved him out the door. Reno stumbled, ending up flat on his face in the gutter, moaning softly.

“Next time I see you in here, I’ll crush them!” the bartender said firmly, before turning on her heel and storming back inside.

Reno rolled to one side, hand between his thighs as he tried to soothe the pain. “I think ya just fuckin’ did…” he groaned.

---

“I think that’s enough for today.”

Elena frowned and stood down from her defensive posture. “Do we have to stop now, sir? I’m just starting to get the hang of this…”

It was true. The woman seemed to have a real knack for defensive spells… even moreso than her affinity for the elemental materia they’d been using up to this point. By the end of their hour-long session, nothing Tseng had thrown at her had gotten through her barrier. While it was true that nothing he had used against her had been very powerful, considering she’d never done this before, it was impressive progress… and he would have liked to have let her keep going, to be honest.

“I’m sorry, Elena… but we’re done. As much as I’d like to continue, I have no desire to face Dr. Ward’s wrath a second time. She was, shall we say, less than pleased when she found out that I allowed you to over-exert yourself during your first lesson.” He smirked slightly. “I don’t think Reno was especially happy about it, either.”

Elena snickered quietly and unslotted the materia from her armlet, placing the spheres back in the storage case. “I don’t blame you for wanting to tread carefully around Dr. Ward. I wouldn’t want to be on her bad side, either…”

“Mmm… She does have quite a way with words. Particularly when she’s angry. And I have, unfortunately, been on the receiving end more times than I care to count. Quite possibly more than anyone, in fact.”

She paused in her minor struggle to release the stiff clasps on her armlet, and looked up at him in surprise. “Really, sir? I would have thought Reno would be the one to hold that honor…”

Tseng laughed and came to her aid, releasing her from the stubborn accessory. “Oh, no… She’s entirely too fond of him to ever truly be angry with him. Frustrated, yes. Annoyed, most certainly… but believe me, Reno has her quite thoroughly charmed. I doubt very much he’s ever felt the full force of her temper, even at his worst. Myself, on the other hand…”

He gestured towards the door, and ushered her out of the training arena.

“What did you do that made her so mad, sir?”

“Failed one too many times to properly look after her favorite patient,” he replied. At her slightly confused expression, he chuckled, “To be perfectly honest, I probably wasn’t quite ready to be in charge of a rookie when I recruited Reno. I had to talk Veld into allowing it just as much as I had to talk him into letting me have him specifically… and as much as I hate to admit it, there was a period of time when Reno suffered for it. I very quickly learned to do better by him… but perhaps not quite quickly enough to gain Justinia’s approval. I think she still holds that against me to some extent.”

“What do you mean… ‘he suffered for it’?”

“I expected far too much of him, much too soon. And I also desperately wanted to prove myself to my own mentor. I pushed him rather relentlessly for a time, because of that. In fact I put him in much the same state you were in after your first materia lesson, on more than one occasion. The doctor finally saw fit to call me out on it… I was actually a bit shocked when I left her office with my head still attached. Anyone listening in would have thought I’d worked him to death, the way she went on…”

“And Reno just let you?” she snickered, “That doesn’t seem like him at all…”

“He has come quite a long way since I first found him…” Tseng replied, chuckling. “Reno was just as anxious to prove himself to Veld as I was, I think. And… he was also deeply afraid that I’d reconsider my choice of rookies, as well, if he wasn’t everything I demanded he be. I didn’t realize that right away, or I might have started to question my tactics a little sooner.” Tseng sighed and shook his head. “It’s… not an easy revelation when you discover just how much harm you’re doing to someone who is ostensibly under your care and protection. Particularly when that someone is little more than a child. As unpleasant as the experience was, I consider myself fortunate that Ward is as… opinionated… as she is.”

“You know, sir… Reno still insists that he was an absolute nightmare for you at first…” the rookie teased.

Tseng smirked slightly. “He does tend to exaggerate at times, doesn’t he? He wasn’t a really nightmare, of course… He was just your average teenager. Though… now that I think about it, those may be one in the same.”

They walked along the hallway, and stood, waiting for the elevator.

“Truthfully,” Tseng added, “As aggravating as he could be, it never once crossed my mind to dismiss him. I will admit, however… for quite some time I did wonder if I’d really done him any favors by recruiting him.”

“I think Reno would disagree, sir…”

“Oh, I know he would,” the Turk leader said, smiling. “But, because of me, he’s been injured repeatedly… nearly killed a dozen times over… tortured more than once. He risks his life just by coming into work everyday… as do we all. The Turks gave him a home and a family, but I have no doubt he would have eventually found those things in the slums as well. It would have gone very different for him if I’d left him there… and it’s very likely his life would be significantly less dangerous if I had. It used to be a grave concern of mine that I stole something from him by bringing him into this life.”

The car arrived and the elevator doors opened, and the pair of Turks brushed past the exiting passengers. Elena waited until the entire group had disembarked and they were alone again before continuing the conversation.

“What changed your mind about that, sir?” she asked, curious.

“Time, mostly. In spite of all of the bad, there has been much more good in his life. More recently, though, the thing that most keeps my guilt at bay is the way he looks at you,” he replied, with a smile. “I think I can safely say that I have never seen Reno happier in all the years I’ve known him.”

---

“…”

“Don’t even fuckin’ ask,” the redhead muttered. Rude shrugged and pushed away from the wall he’d been leaning against, repressing the urge to smirk. Apparently, the redhead’s charms didn’t work especially well on Miss Lockheart… and judging by his partner’s somewhat pained gait, neither did his usual skill at avoiding a physical confrontation.

“No luck, then?” he asked, putting his amusement aside and getting back to the task at hand. Reno shook his head.

“No sign of any of ’em, ‘cept your girlfriend. Place was practically dead. Tifa says hi, by the way… ya know… if grabbin’ a guy by the balls and shoving him out the door is how she typically greets people. Which I guess means I owe ya ten gil…”

Rude snorted a quiet laugh. “You alright?”

“Yeah,” he sighed, “All in all, she probably coulda done a lot worse. Glad me ‘n ‘Lena had some fun over lunch, though. I don’t think I’m gonna be in the mood tonight…”

The two Turks started down the narrow road, back towards the train station. This trip was a bust. They really hadn’t done anything except successfully waste a lot of time.

“Thought Elena wasn’t willing to ‘go out for lunch’ anymore…”

“Yeah, well… With her family at her place right now, and Lira living in my old apartment…” He shrugged and trailed off. “… And, do me a favor. Don’t mention to her that I told ya about our little lunch date. I’d kinda like to keephavin’ those…”

The bald Turk snickered quietly. “What’s with you lately?”

“The fuck’re ya talkin’ about?”

“Moving in with Elena? Openly discussing things you know would piss her off? Almost like you’re suddenly not terrified of driving her away anymore…” he teased.

“Fuck off,” the redhead shot back, rolling his eyes. Rude let a grin creep over his face.

“You’re not, are you…” he stated. They stepped onto the platform. Rude could see the train winding its way down the central pillar and glanced at his watch. It was running a little late today. “Are you?” he prodded, when Reno didn’t answer him.

His friend fidgeted awkwardly. “Not terrified…” he admitted, with a small smile. “Still slightly anxious, maybe. Guess I just figured that if she wasn’t willin’ to ditch me over the whole thing with Lira, it’s gonna take a hell of a lot to convince her I suck as boyfriend.”

“Hmph… Progress at last,” Rude said, clapping the younger man on the back and letting his arm rest over the redhead’s shoulders. Reno glared at him briefly, but didn’t make any move to extricate himself.

“Don’t you dare fuckin’ say ‘I told you so’,” he warned him. The train finally arrived, and Rude tightened his grip on his partner in a odd sort of half hug, before gently shoving him forward through the open door in the car that had come to a stop in front of them. He followed him aboard.

“I told you so.”

---

“As soon as Reno and Rude return… assuming our issue hasn’t been dealt with… I want a security sweep of all of the city’s reactors.”

“Sir?” Elena queried from her seat at her desk, “Are you sure we’re not overreacting a little? I mean… Avalanche has always been more talk than action. And after all the new security we helped implement…”

The Wutaiian Turk sighed and leaned against the corner of Rude’s desk. “Yes, I know… It does seem just a little paranoid on my part.” He shook his head and glanced over at the clock. Nearly two in the afternoon. “Still… I have a bad feeling about them. Particularly since the acquisition of this alleged ex-Soldier.”

Elena wasn’t sure she agreed. Sure, it was a nice brag, but she was inclined to think that’s all it was… and she knew that Reno wasn’t entirely convinced this new recruit was anything more than your slightly above average mercenary, either. But then… she supposed it was better to be over prepared than under. Before she could say as much, the office door opened and the pair of absent Turks trudged back inside… Rude looking slightly disappointed behind the mask of his ever-present sunglasses, and Reno immediately flopped onto the couch with a loud groan.

“No luck, I take it?” Tseng asked.

“Not in locating Avalanche,” Rude replied, “Reno got groped, though, if that counts.”

The redhead glowered at his partner. “If that’s your idea of bein’ groped, it’s no wonder you can’t get a fuckin’ date…”

Rude snickered and sat down at his desk. “They’ve made themselves scarce. Closest we got was the Seventh Heaven bartender…”

“Who got a little too close to me… and not in a good way…” the redhead interjected.

“Other than that, everything’s quiet in Sector 7.”

Tseng frowned thoughtfully. “In that case… don’t get comfortable.”

“Boss?” Reno questioned, sitting up slightly.

“As I was just telling Elena before the two of you returned, I want security sweeps of the reactors. I’ll head to One. Rude, start with Three. Reno and Elena, take Six. We’ll meet up again at Number Eight.”

“On it, Boss.” Reno dragged himself back to his feet.

---

The Number 6 Reactor seemed somehow larger than the last time she’d been this close to it… though at least this time around there was no bomb-filled train barreling towards it. As far as she knew, anyway. Even so, it felt a lot more foreboding now.

Maybe because the last time, she’d only been overseeing an evacuation. She hadn’t even gone inside… Tseng had handled that, leaving her out on the street to direct the Shinra personnel towards the safe zone. It was strange, really… it wasn’t as if she’d never been inside a reactor before. They’d all spent the better part of two weeks in and out of several of them during the initial security upgrade last year.

But Number 6 was different.

“Hey, come on… We gotta get through here and then go check out Numbers 7 and 8. So unless you wanna be at this ’til dinner time, keep up, ‘Lena,” Reno prodded her, and she suddenly realized that she had indeed fallen quite a ways behind, just staring up at the looming structure. Elena hurried to catch up to him.

“Sorry…”

They mounted the stairs to the main entrance, and Reno swiped his ID card through the reader. The security door slid open, and the pair of Turks headed in with a brief nod to the two men standing guard just inside the door.

“‘Kay… You’ve never been stuck with Reactor security before, so just follow me on this one. I’ll let you run the show at Seven and we’ll see how much of the process ya remember,” he said, grinning.

“Oh… um… Right,” she replied, somewhat distractedly. The rookie was a little preoccupied looking around at the cold, metal-paneled corridor. She shuddered involuntarily.

Reno paused for a moment, glancing back at her. “Somethin’ wrong?”

She didn’t have time to answer him. A man was heading down the corridor, straight for them, with a determined step. He was older, with thinning hair and a grizzled beard, a hard hat tucked under one arm.

“You damn Turks are goddamned paranoid fucks, ya know that? First ya come in here to oversee a metric shit-ton of upgrades no one goddamn needs, then ya send out a goddamn level two security notice to the control room… now you’re out here interruptin’ my goddamn afternoon to come look at door locks and guard stations, and I gotta play tour guide. Don’t you assholes have anything better to do? ‘Cause I sure as fuck do…”

“Heh… Yeah, nice to see you again, too, Bastion,” Reno snickered. Elena blinked in surprised at the name.

“Bastion?” she echoed, uncertainly. “Bastion… Meheara?” She looked him over a bit more carefully. It certainly could have been him… though a dozen or so years older than the last time she’d seen him. She hadn’t even known he still worked the reactors… much less Number 6. He seemed surprised for a moment, before his eyes widened in recognition. Reno cast her a quizzical look.

“Ellie Brewer… Well, goddamn,” the man replied, tone immediately shifting to one that was much more friendly. “You’ve certainly done a bit of growin’. I haven’t see you since… well… Not for a good long while, anyway. I, uh… I heard about your brother. I’m sorry. Woulda come to pay my respects, but… I wasn’t sure how welcome I’d be.”

Bastion had been one of her father’s best friends. He’d worked under him as assistant foreman at the Number Six reactor, and they’d both been on duty the day it had malfunctioned. Bastion had made it out… because her father hadn’t. He had gone on ahead while Aaron Brewer had stayed behind in the control room in an attempt to buy the workers a little more time. And ultimately, her father done so… but he hadn’t bought enough of it to make it out himself. She hadn’t seen much of her father’s friend after the funeral… Her mother had never explicitly said so, but Elena had been old enough at the time to pick up on the fact that she’d blamed Bastion, at least in part, for his death. They’d lost contact years ago.

“You should have come. I’d have been glad to see you,” Elena said, with a somewhat sad smile. Bastion awkwardly cleared his throat.

“So… A Turk, eh?” he said, changing the subject. “Well, don’t that beat all. And they stuck ya with this annoying son of a bitch, too… Who’d you piss off to end up with luck like that?”

“Hey!” Reno shot back, indignantly, and Elena laughed.

“He’s not really that bad…”

The redhead sighed and shook his head. “Can we just get this over with? Us Turks got other shit to do, too, ya know… You’re not the only one around here who works for a living.”

Bastion grunted affirmatively. “Fine… Follow me, and keep on this side of the white line.” Elena looked down at her feet and suddenly realized that there was a long white stripe painted down one side of the hallway, leading straight through the door at the far end. That was odd. She didn’t remember anything like that in the Number 1 Reactor when she’d been there… but then, they hadn’t actually gone in through the main entrance. They’d used an auxiliary entrance beneath the reactor to offload the equipment from one of Junon’s airships.

“Lot’s of moving parts in the next room, and if ya don’t know where they’re headin’, it’s real easy to get clobbered by ’em. This side of the line’s the safe zone,” Reno explained as Bastion moved off ahead of them to unlock the door. He dropped his voice slightly. “… Guess I kinda forgot. This is where your dad… worked… huh?”

The pause wasn’t exactly subtle. He’d intended to say something else, and thought better of it. She was grateful he had.

“Yeah.”

“You gonna be alright with this?”

“Yeah, it’s fine. It’s just… weird,” the rookie said. “So… I take it you and Bastion don’t reSally get along?”

He shrugged. “Eh… He’s alright. But I’m only ever here where Tseng orders me to grossly inconvenience him, so…”

“Move it along, Red… We got thirty points of interest for you to okay, and I’m on a double production schedule this week ’cause Number 1 and Number 5’re shut down for maintenance,” Bastion called over his shoulder, waiting impatiently at the door.

“Yeah, yeah… Don’t lose your shit. We’re comin’…”

The pair followed him through the door, and Elena got her first good look at the inner workings of a mako reactor. Turbines in huge, transparent pipes spun at dizzying speeds, and overhead, dozens of robotic arms swung this way and that.

“Those mostly stop things from breaking down around here,” Bastion explained, following the rookie’s gaze upwards. “Lot of automation… lot of stuff we do manually, too, though, to keep all that automation working.” They continued on to an elevator at the far end of the room and stepped aboard. Bastion closed the gate and the platform descended to the next level down and another metal hallway. This one contained a number of doors that branched off into individual offices, supply rooms, and the like. They were being lead towards the one labeled ‘Main Control’.

Halfway along, Elena stopped short, eyes dawn to a grouping of framed photos on the wall. Most, she didn’t recognize… but the one in the center…

“Lost a lot of good people that day,” Bastion piped up, somberly, having noticed that the young woman was no longer following the two men. Reno walked the short distance back to her.

“That your dad?” he asked, following her gaze to the photo. Elena nodded, silently. His hand settled itself in the small of her back, rubbing lightly along her spine. He gave her a moment to compose herself before adding gently, “Come on… We got work to do.”

---

Tseng made his way out of Reactor Number 1, heading for his car. The reactor was currently in a partial shut down for scheduled maintenance… and that in and of itself worried him a little. It left a handful of avenues open for penetration that normally wouldn’t have been an issue. The foreman had told him that Number 5 was in a similar state and that Numbers 2 and 6 had increased production to make up for it.

To his mind, that gave Avalanche four prime targets. One and Five would be easier to access. Two and Six would cause a larger disruption. On the bright side, that very likely eliminated half the city’s reactors as targets… The downside was that the threat Rude had been informed of would almost certainly occur at some point within the maintenance window, which stretched from today through Wednesday of the following week. He had already phoned and spoken to Heidegger about increasing the number of guards on those four reactors until it was finished… a recommendation to which his superior had agreed.

In the meantime, he was off to Number 2. Rude was likely one his way to his next destination as well, though he suspected that Reno would take his time at Number 6. Elena had never been through a security inspection before, and knowing the protocol and actually seeing it firsthand were two different things.

He frowned in thought as he climbed into the car and pulled the seat belt across his body. If it were him, he’d target one or both of the reactors pulling double duty. That would guarantee a significant disruption to the power grid, and likely a longer than usual recovery time. If you wanted to send a message and sow discord, that was certainly the way to do it.

But he was perfectly aware that the members of Avalanche may not be thinking in the same vein. The other two reactors were the easier targets. This was their first major move since Shinra had taken an interest in the group, and they had shown themselves to be cautious. They might try testing the waters a bit first, rather than going for the grander attack.

Or they might simply throw caution to the wind… which unfortunately still left him with four potential targets.

Tseng shook his head and sped off towards his next stop. He wasn’t going to accomplish anything just sitting there.

---

Elena groaned as she let herself sink down onto the couch.

“Long day, sweet pea?” Josephine asked, warmly, handing her granddaughter a cup of tea and joining her. ‘Long day’ didn’t even begin to describe it. After Reactor Number 6, they’d gone on to inspect 7 and 8… Reno had pressed her to take the lead at 7, but their previous stop seemed to have made a much bigger impression on her than she’d thought it would. She’d been distracted and withdrawn for the rest of the day.

Worse, she felt intensely guilty over it, because she’d more or less foisted her half of the responsibility off on Reno… and on top of that, she was pretty sure she’d failed miserably at learning anything he’d been trying to teach her.

She’d never expected it to affect her so badly. It had happened twelve years ago. But suddenly being confronted with her father’s death all over again had been emotional, to say the least… and it had been just as sudden the first time around, too.

She’d kept it together, but by the end of the day she was certain Reno could see her starting to falter… which was probably why he’d sent her home without him when Tseng had requested he stay for a while to go over any problems they’d encountered during the security sweeps. Rude had stuck around of his own accord to see to any new reports, and Elena had felt a little bad just taking off… but the redhead had insisted.

“El?” her brother’s voice broke in, and she suddenly realized that she’d been sitting there, staring at the tea in her mug.

“Reno and I had to go to the Number 6 reactor today…” she sighed, “It was a lot harder than I ever thought it’d be.”

“Oh… I see,” her grandmother replied understandingly, patting her shoulder, “Does he know?”

The rookie nodded. “That’s why he sent me home. Everyone else is working late tonight. I really should be, too… I was completely useless all afternoon.”

Josephine smiled warmly. “Well… I doubt very much that Reno will hold that against you. Now, dinner’s nearly ready, and you’ll feel much better once you’ve eaten.”

Elena managed a smile as well. Food was Nana’s solution to just about everything. To be fair… it usually seemed to work. “Yes, Nana…”

Josephine got up to see to her meatloaf, and Del quickly took her place. “Must’ve been weird, walking in there. I don’t think I’d want to.”

The rookie laughed softly. “You know… I was more or less okay, right up until we went down to the control room. There’s a memorial. Dad’s photo right in the middle, and everyone else who didn’t make it out, too. It caught me really off-guard. I wasn’t expecting anything like that, and I guess Bastion didn’t think to warn me about it.”

“Bastion? Bastion’s still there?” Del asked, surprised.

“Yeah… he’s the reactor foreman, now. I haven’t seen him… haven’t even heard from him… in years, and then all of a sudden he’s walking down the hall towards me. So I guess the visit wasn’t all bad. It was kind of nice to reconnect a little.”

“Reno have anything to say when he realized what was going on?” her brother pried, and Elena narrowed her eyes.

“Del… don’t start. Not tonight.”

“I didn’t mean it like that…” he began, only to stop at the slightly annoyed glare from his sister. “Okay… maybe I kind of meant it like that. I’m trying to like him, El. I really am. And… I’ll admit, he’s not completely awful.”

Elena snickered softly.

“What?”

“Nothing… It’s just that… That’s almost word for word what I said when he first asked if I was attracted to him…”

Del rolled his eyes. “Don’t go getting any ideas…”

“I’m pretty sure you’re not his type. And anyway, he’s mine,” she giggled softly. “I’m just saying… He’ll grow on you if you let him. I know how he can come across sometimes… but Reno really is a terrific guy.”

“Alright, you two… dinner!” Josephine suddenly called out from the kitchen.

---

“Please?”

“No.”

“Please? Just for a few blocks?”

“What part of ‘no’ was unclear?”

“The ‘no’ part?” Reno teased. “I mean… it does leave a lot of room for interpretation, boss…”

“Reno…” Tseng groaned, and pinched the bridge of his nose. At this rate, the redhead was going to pester him the entire way home.

Which, now that he thought about it, he probably should have expected. The man had been dropping subtle hints about wanting to drive it since he’d first seen the new car. Reno sighed in resignation.

“Fine… be that way. Do me a favor, though… there’s a flower shop on 28th street. Swing by and see if they’re still open, will ya?”

Tseng’s eyebrow rose in curiosity. “What exactly have you done that warrants flowers?” Elena had left at the end of the day rather than wait for Reno to finish up the meeting he had pulled him into. The whole reason he was giving him a ride tonight to begin with was that she and Reno were still carpooling this week and her earlier departure had left him stranded. If flowers were required, it seemed there had been more reason for it than the rookie simply being eager to get home to her visiting relatives.

The redhead glared at him. “Ya know… I’m seriously gettin’ sick of everyone just automatically jumpin’ to the conclusion that I fucked up any time I do somethin’ nice for my girlfriend…”

Tseng chuckled and turned down 28th Street. The man had a point. It wasn’t really fair. That didn’t make teasing him any less enjoyable, however. “What’s the occasion, then?”

He shrugged. “Hittin’ up Number 6 today was kinda rough on her. Not sure if she ever mentioned it to ya, but her dad was the foreman there when it blew. I just figured some flowers might cheer her up a little.”

“… I had thought she seemed a bit subdued when we returned to the office. No… I knew her father had worked in the reactors, but I was not aware of that.” He stopped in front of the shop where lights still shown in the windows. “It looks as though you’re in luck.”

---

“More pie, dear?”

Elena suppressed the urge to moan in agony. Yes… food was definitely Nana’s solution to everything. And not having redhead around to bear the brunt of it, meant she’d ended up eating far more than she should have.

“I’d love to, Nana… But there’s just no more room…” she managed. “Besides… Reno will be devastated if he misses out on dessert.”

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” Josephine smiled, “I made him his own. I think I’m finally making progress with that poor boy… He’s definitely starting to fill in a bit. His sweet little friend, too…”

“Lira?” the rookie asked, somewhat surprised.

“Oh, didn’t we tell you?” Del interjected, with a roll of his eyes “Nana’s insisted that we go over and keep her company while you were at work every day this week.”

Josephine chuckled softly. “Well, she should hardly be expected to cook for herself in her condition, and she needs to keep her strength up for the baby’s sake. And don’t you act as though I dragged you along, Delion. I told you I was going to go and look in on her for a bit. You came of your own accord every time. And spent far more time talking with her than even I did, I might add…”

Elena stared at her brother, surprised.

“Del?” she queried. He shifted awkwardly, and Elena was almost certain for a moment that he was actually blushing.

“She’s… nice,” he said, simply.

“And very pretty…” Josephine snuck in, in a teasing tone.

“Nana!”

This time, Elena was absolutely positive her brother was blushing. In fact, he looked downright scandalized, and she giggled quietly wondering just how Reno would react to that. In a way, Lira was an awful lot like a sister to the redhead, and she knew firsthand how over-protective brothers could be…

She didn’t have long to dwell on the thought, however. A key rattled softly in the lock and the door to her apartment swung inward as the very subject of her musings arrived home.

“Well, it’s about time!” Nana chided, good-naturedly, before he could say anything. “You know, when I was growing up, if we were so late we missed supper, we either went without or cooked for ourselves.” She laughed quietly to herself, before adding, “You’re lucky I always hated that rule. Come sit down and eat something. You must be starving by now.”

“Heh… In a minute, Nana,” he replied, moving instead towards the couch, and the siblings seated on it. He leaned over and kissed Elena on the cheek. “Gotcha somethin’…”

The rookie smiled as Reno produced a bouquet from behind his back. Daisies and carnations… her favorites. Though how he’d known that, she wasn’t sure. She didn’t remember ever telling him…

“Thought they might make you feel better after this afternoon…”

“Oh, Reno… They’re beautiful…” Elena smiled and pulled him towards her, capturing his lips and letting her fingers toy with his hair. When she finally released him, he grinned.

“I’m gonna have to start bringin’ you flowers more often…” he gently taunted her.

---

It was some time later that they finally crawled into bed. Josephine had only relented on stuffing the redhead to the point of bursting after Elena had suggested a walk. The relieved expression on Reno’s face had drawn a laugh even from Del, and the rookie had found herself elated that her brother really did seem to be trying to find things he liked about him. It was getting dark by the time they returned, and they’d spent a little while playing a few friendly card games before calling it a night.

“Remind me never to play poker with Nana for real,” Reno said, yawning widely as he turned down the bed and crawled under the covers. “After those last few hands, I get the distinct impression that she’d clean me out and laugh all the way to the bank afterwards.”

She climbed in beside him and curled up in his arms.

“Trust me… she would,” she murmured against her neck.

“Nana’s fuckin’ awesome…” he chuckled, and kissed the top of her head. Elena sighed and let her eyes drift shut.

“Tomorrow’s Saturday…” she said quietly, a few minutes later, “I know we’re still on alert, but do you want to try and do something a little more fun than just getting beaten at poker? It’s their last day here, after all. They’ll be heading home Sunday morning.”

“Sure… Anything ya want, ‘Lena,” the redhead said, sleepily.

“We should find something we can take Lira along for… I bet she’d love to get outside for awhile…”

“Mmmhmm…” He nestled closer to her and sighed in content, beginning to drift off. Elena smirked slightly.

“And I know Del would love it if she came. I think he’s got a little bit of a crush on her…”

“Mmm… That’s nice…” he replied, automatically. It took a moment for her words to fully register, but she had no problem pinpointing the exact moment they did. His entire body tensed and his eyes snapped open as he pulled away, staring at her in a mixture of confusion, shock, and possibly horror. “He what?!”

---

The sun wasn’t even up yet, but Tseng most certainly was. Sleep had simply refused to claim him last night. He’d spent much of it tossing and turning, trying to ignore the sense of foreboding that had begun to plague him yesterday morning, in the hopes of snatching at least a few hours. He’d finally given up just before dawn.

And now, he was jogging along lamp-lit streets, as the sun was just beginning to peek over the edge of the Plate. He stopped when he reached the little cafe on the corner, and turned to head back. It was much too early for it to be open yet, or else he would have put his run on hold for something to eat. It was the only place within walking distance of his apartment that served something even vaguely close to a traditional Wutaiian breakfast… not quite what he remembered from his childhood, and heavily influenced by Midgar’s melting pot of cultures… but still very enjoyable. Certainly better than his own cooking, at any rate.

Maybe he’d come back later.

He felt it before he heard it. In fact, the ground beneath his feet shook so violently for a moment that he stumbled mid-stride and had to grab hold of a nearby street sign for support. After that came the sound… an ear-splitting boom that threatened to deafen him after he’d grown so used to the early morning silence. He knew immediately what it was without even looking.

Tseng turned to face the edge of the Sector 1 Plate and the reactor that stood there. Thick, black smoke curled into the sky, and he could see and hear the smaller explosions that were still going off. He was far enough away that there was no danger… but many others in the sector weren’t going to be so lucky.

With a grim expression, he reached for his PHS. Avalanche had finally made their move.

~fin~