Desha's Reno of the Turks Fan Fiction

Chapter 84: Reno & Kai’s Whirlwind Adventure

Reno grimaced slightly as he swallowed the mouthful of cold, gelatinous goo that coated a thick, spongy block of… something. It didn’t really taste all that bad, but the texture… ugh. It was like eating slime mold… which he had the misfortune to be able to say he’d done once or twice as a kid. There was an edible – well… edible in that it wouldn’t make you sick if you ingested it. Getting it down was another matter entirely – type found rather abundantly in certain parts of the Sector 2 slums known affectionately as “cripshay vomit” among the locals. This was marginally better by comparison… though he certainly wouldn’t have deemed it “good” by any stretch of the imagination.

The two garrison soldiers sitting across from him snickered unabashedly at his expression. They’d introduced themselves just a short while ago as Corporal Jack Travis and Private Jamie Keller. Travis was the slightly older, obviously more seasoned of the two. Keller, to Reno’s eye at least, seemed like he was practically right out of basic training. The kid couldn’t have been more than eighteen… and had it not been for the fact that he’d been permitted to join the Shinra army, the redhead might have pegged him as being a year or two younger than that, even.

“Tasty, ain’t it?” Travis proclaimed, laughingly.

“Heh… believe it or not, I’ve actually eaten much worse,” the redhead returned.

“On purpose?” Keller prodded, grinning. Reno returned the joking smile.

“Sometimes…” he replied, snickering, “The fuck’s this shit s’posed to be, anyway?”

“Mushroom omelet,” the more senior of the pair, said, tossing him the wrapper from the ration packet, “Prefer the cheese ones myself. And they’re better hot, but we’re waiting on a part from Junon to fix the damn stove right now. Haven’t even been able to boil water without freezing our asses off over a fire outside for the last three days. I tell ya… I’ll be damn glad when this rotation’s over. Just my luck I drew holiday detail this year. Christmas at Fort Condor ain’t as festive as it sounds.”

Reno nodded, but didn’t comment. He felt a little bad for the guys stuck here. Not many visitors, no real days off… and they’d gotten saddled with everyone’s least favorite assignment. Holiday duty.

“Anyway… enough whining about shit orders I can’t change. Finish up. We’re heading out on morning patrol in ten.”

The redhead obliged, choking down the rest of his breakfast in short order, and soon, he found himself loaded onto the back of a heavily abused ATV outfitted for the icy terrain with skids that let it glide over the snow like a snowmobile. He was seated behind Keller on one machine, while Travis took the lead on a second. The morning air was cold and crisp, and the sun had barely risen high enough to light their way. The temperature had been dropping steadily overnight, and to say that it was frosty out was an understatement. Riding on the ATV, the wind their travel generated was cold enough to sting his skin.

They rode steadily south, towards the ocean, for almost an hour before the two-man patrol unit slowed to a stop near a lone boulder that sat on the snowy ground.

“This is as far as we can take you, sir,” Travis said, after pausing to lift the visor on his helmet. “We gotta turn west from here.”

Reno climbed off of the ATV, shivering slightly as a sudden gust of wind whipped past him.

“Heh… Thanks for the lift. Try not to freeze out there,” Reno replied, with a slight grin.

“Hmph… Says the guy walking to Ferryport,” he snickered. The pair waved as they revved their engines and sped off, leaving him to his own devices in the snow. Reno turned back towards the tiny village in the distance before beginning the long walk towards it. It didn’t look like too far of a walk, really. Two miles… at most. He could have covered that amount of ground in thirty minutes or so, easy, if he were really serious about it… certainly in less than an hour.

Though, that was if he weren’t trudging his way through almost a foot of fresh snow.

His first step away from the boulder sent him almost knee deep into the white stuff, and he groaned. Make that two feet of fresh snow. The redhead sighed and shook his head, resigning himself to the fact that it was going to be a long walk.

---

Tseng was roused early from a rather rough night’s sleep by the droning of his PHS. He hadn’t managed to get much actual sleep, owing to the fact that his sinuses felt as though they were planning to explode from the sheer amount of pressure they were under every time he tried to lay down. He’d ended up propping himself upright with a stack of pillows… which was not the most comfortable of positions, but at least it had allowed him to breathe. More or less.

“Yes, sir?” he managed to answer the summons in a notably strained voice. He heard Veld chuckle softly on the other end of the line.

“I take it you’re not over your cold quite yet…” he replied, somewhat teasingly. Tseng rolled his eyes, but refrained from taking the bait. It was really his own fault, anyway… Years of insisting that he was well enough to work when he very clearly wasn’t had turned it into something of a yearly ritual between the two of them, even though nowadays he was considerably more willing to stay home and recover. Well… once someone ordered him to do so.

“No, sir… Unfortunately not,” he said, trying to cover a cough.

“Well, you’ll be happy to know that you’re not the only one who won’t be coming in today,” his mentor informed him.

“Sir?” Tseng queried, one eyebrow rising in curiosity.

“We had quite the storm overnight. It’s going to be awhile before the roads are passable, and it looks like we’ve got another round incoming later this afternoon. The Board made the decision first thing this morning. Headquarters is largely shut down, and only essential reactor personnel are explicitly required to report. I’ve already notified the rest of the team to simply stay home. We’re on-call, but I very seriously doubt we’ll be needed when half the city is shut down,” he said. “I sent word to Fort Condor via Junon, as well, telling Reno to stay put if things look bad out there. Haven’t heard back yet… but I’m not surprised. The communications officer at the base still sounded half asleep when I got hold of him.”

Tseng silently fought back a yawn. “Well… at least that’s one thing I won’t have to worry about today…” he replied, and then smiled slightly, “Though if things are that bad, I supposed that means I’m on my own for breakfast.”

Veld snorted in amusement. “Breakfast, yes. Lunch? Hmph. I don’t think I could keep Esme from coming to your rescue if I tried… and I’ve been married to her long enough to know better than to try.”

“I heard that!” Tseng heard a familiar voice warningly intone somewhere in the background, and he snickered softly. His mentor ignored it.

“Get some rest. I’ll update you if and when I hear from Reno… and to warn you of Esme’s imminent arrival on your doorstep with most of the contents of our refrigerator.”

“I heard that, too!” Esme decreed from a much closer distance this time, “Keep it up, and you’ll be having cold cereal for breakfast. Oh… Felicia, dear, not the rye bread. That’s for Tseng. Use the wheat for your toast today, please.”

Veld sighed, the sound quickly morphing into a soft laugh. “Like I said… She’ll see you at lunch time with all of our food.”

---

Reno stepped into the little pub that sat alongside the docks on the southern shore, and shook the snow out of his hair, swearing under his breath as some of the melting ice slipped inside his coat and past the collar of his shirt. He looked around. The place was largely empty.

Of course, it was also barely eight in the morning. The handful of customers that were scattered about the place seemed far more interested in breakfast than the liquor he could see stocked behind the bar. A hand-painted sign pointed up a flight of stairs, indicating that there were rooms for rent for thirty gil a night on the upper floors, so apparently the pub doubled as the tiny village’s inn, as well.

The man behind the bar gave the Turk a friendly nod as he made his way over.

“What can I getcha?” he asked.

“Coffee?” Reno asked, hopefully. He’d had to forgo it at Fort Condor for the same reason he’d had to choke down a cold field ration omelet. A busted stove and no one willing to brave the freezing temperatures so early in the morning to boil water over a fire outside. The bartender nodded understandingly, reaching for the recently-brewed pot beside him. He filled a mug and passed it over. Reno grinned and added sugar from the container sitting on the bar. “And some information, if ya got it…” he added, taking a drink before sighing, “Oh, fuck, I needed that…”

“Two gil for the coffee. Price of information depends on what ya need to know,” the man replied. Reno pulled a twenty from his pocket and slid it across the bar.

“I’m lookin’ for someone. Heard she mighta come this way not too long ago. ‘Bout five foot nothin’, brown hair, violet eyes… has a thing for sharp, pointy objects? Might be doin’ some camping nearby.”

“Oooh… The mini merc…” the bartender chuckled, and Reno raised an eyebrow.

“… Mini merc?” he repeated, unable to keep the snort of amusement out of his reply.

“Yeah, she’s been around. Comes in every once in awhile for supplies… or just to get good ‘n drunk. Either way, she’s been a good customer. Been workin’ for hire for… couple months, maybe? Just kind of showed up one day offering her services.” He laughed softly and leaned forward over the bar. “… No one took her seriously at first… ’til someone was dumb enough to start a fight with her. Made quite the reputation for herself after that.”

“Heh… I bet,” Reno snickered, just picturing what must have gone down if some random local had tried to take on a fully trained Turk head to head, “Ya know how I can get in touch with her?”

The bartender reached out and picked up the twenty gil note from the bar, pointedly folding it and tucking it into a pocket. The redhead rolled his eyes and pulled out a second, setting it in place of the first.

“Well… I’m not exactly sure where it is she’s stayin’. Not on the mainland… I do know that much. She comes in for whatever she needs, then hops the ferry to one of the islands.” He nodded to a corkboard on the far wall, “Takes job requests through our notice board. You can leave her a message there… or you can try your luck with the ferry captains. They might tell ya where they drop her off. Or they might tell ya to go sit on an anchor ‘n rotate. Fifty-fifty on that. She was just here night before last… so it’ll probably be a few days, at least, before she comes back. Think she picked up a new job, though. Might try askin’ the person who put up the ad.”

“And who would that be?” Reno queried. The bartender was right. If he couldn’t contact Kai directly, maybe he could get to her through whoever she was working for. The twenty gil on the bar disappeared into a pocket to join its friend. “Tch… expensive place…” the redhead muttered. He finished off the cup of coffee and set it on the bar before pulling out a third bill. The bartender just smirked as he refilled the cup, and nodded to a table in the corner.

“Pretty sure it was Annie Murdoc over there. Breeds chocobos up in the foothills… Real high quality animals. Purebred bloodlines from past Chocobo Cup winners. Ya know… Expensive. She’s been havin’ some trouble with rustlers lately. Two or three of her birds have gone missing over the last few days and she’s not happy about it. Saw her pinning something on the board the other day. Ad wasn’t there anymore after your friend left.”

Reno glanced over at the woman. She was older… in her late fifties, maybe even early sixties… with the look of someone who was more than just passingly familiar with manual labor. Her graying hair was pulled back in a utilitarian braid, and she was, at that moment, focused solely on her plate of bacon eggs… the latter of which she was stabbing angrily with a fork.

“Thanks,” the redhead replied, and the bartender chuckled.

“Watch yourself. Her bite’s just as bad as her bark and she’s been in a mood ever since the first bird disappeared.”

“Great…” Reno sighed. He picked up his coffee and turned away from the bar, steeling himself for the conversation he knew had to happen. As the approached, the woman didn’t even bother looking up at him.

“What the hell do you want?” she asked, in a gruff and decidedly unfriendly voice.

Oh, yeah… this was gonna a real pleasant conversation. Reno grinned and plopped down in the seat across from her.

“Heard ya raise chocobos…” he said, opting against the direct approach. The woman snorted and finally deigned to raise an appraising eye to look him over.

“You couldn’t afford my birds, Slim,” Annie said, curtly, and went back her meal.

“Also heard you were missin’ some…”

She slammed her fork down on the table and glowered at him.

“What do you know about that?” she demanded, and the next thing Reno knew, he was staring down the barrel of a large caliber handgun. The Turk raised his hands in surrender.

“Whoa… Easy. I’m not looking to get shot here…” he replied, “Look… I’ll get straight to the point. Did you hire a woman named Kai to get ’em back for ya?”

Annie’s eyes narrowed. “Why should I tell you shit? I don’t know you from chocobo dung.”

“I’m – Okay, seriously, lady, would ya get that fuckin’ hand cannon outta my face already? She’s family, okay? She took off awhile back. I’m tryin’ to find her.”

“Hmph… if she took off, maybe she don’t want to be found,” the woman muttered, but she did finally lower her weapon. Reno took that as progress.

“Yeah… well… maybe not, but she’s still family ‘n people are worried. I’m not gonna stop lookin’ just ’cause she wants to keep hidin’. So did ya hire her or not?”

Annie eyed him for a moment longer, and then went back to her eggs.

“Yeah, I hired her,” she replied, “Sick of those Titan-be-sodomized rustlers stealing my livestock. Those birds are purebred racers. My main breeding male was Chocobo World Cup champion four times over before he retired, and he sired what’s likely to be the next title-holder… who’s also been stolen, along with one of my best females. I want ’em back, and that gal’s got a reputation ’round here for results.”

“So… you know where she is, then…” Reno prodded, and the chocobo breeder snorted.

“Hmph… What makes you think I’m going to help you? You get to talkin’ to her, and convince her to go back to wherever she came from, and then what? I’m hung out to dry?”

The redhead grinned and leaned back slightly in his chair. “… ‘kay. How ’bout I give her a hand lookin’ for these rustlers of yours first? I’ll help her find ’em for ya… no charge… then I’ll talk her into comin’ home.”

Annie glanced up at him, one eyebrow rising in interest. “Gotta admit… Hard to turn down a free hire…”

---

The tracks ended on a rocky outcrop, where the wind had blown so hard overnight that it had scoured away the snow from the barren surface. Kai crouched down, looking for any hint of where they’d gone. She’d been following these tracks for most of the morning, and they were already growing faint as more snow drifted over them in the harsh mountain winds, even in the deeper areas. Now they’d disappeared completely.

But she knew there were other ways to track, and she was well acquainted with them all.

These thieves were smart. They hadn’t just grabbed the last bird and run. They’d taken a twisting, turning path away from the Murdoc ranch… Stopped more than once to cover their route, and even doubled back a few times. Anything they could to confuse the trail, and throw off anyone who might be following them.

This was the third chocobo that had been stolen from Annie’s ranch in a week. Whoever they were, they were patient… never taking more than one animal at a time, never causing a disturbance that would alert the farmhands or Annie herself. The woman had told her that she’d sat up several nights this past week in the hopes of catching them red-handed. Even that somehow hadn’t been enough. Which was why she’d turned to the new merc in town in the first place.

Mercenary work hadn’t actually been in her plans when she’d gone south from Midgar. Kai had just sort of fallen into it after she’d helped out a small caravan of building supplies that had been set upon by levicrons out on the plains. They were heading in the same direction she was, anyway… so she’d ended up escorting them to Ferryport.

At first, she’d just intended to pass through on her way to… wherever she was going. She hadn’t had any particular destination in mind. Just… away. Away from Midgar. Away from people.

… away from anyone else she could inadvertently hurt with her own stupidity.

In the end, though, she’d stuck around. The islands just offshore were isolated and quiet, and largely uninhabited. The mainland was close enough that if she needed supplies, a drink, or the occasional conversation, it was only a couple of hours round trip from her camp. And then she’d found the job board at the pub, and she’d suddenly found herself in the role of a merc. Compared to being a Turk, working as a mercenary for hire was child’s play.

And more importantly, it had given her time to think.

Kai suddenly froze in her tracks as the fine hair on the back of her neck stood on end, the familiar sensation of being watched sounding alarm bells in her mind. Her eyes narrowed dangerously, and she casually let one of the blades concealed up her sleeves slip into the palm of her hand. A split second later, she spun in the direction of the perceived threat, flinging the knife just to the left of her target. It struck the trunk of a spindly pine tree with a loud thunk. A warning… with the promise of more to come if her shadow tried anything stupid.

“Tch… yeah, nice to see you, too, Kai,” a familiar voice responded in a lazy, unconcerned drawl.

The diminutive Turk blinked, not entirely believing her own eyes when she realized who her stalker actually was.

“… Baby Turkling?” she breathed in shock. Reno sighed and rolled his eyes.

“For fuck’s sake… are you ever gonna let me outgrow that stupid nickname?” he groaned. He turned and yanked the blade out of the trunk before grinning at her and making his way down from the small stand of trees he’d emerged from and onto a snow covered boulder. Kai shook her head, trying to figure out where in the Nine Hells the younger Turk had come from.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, and the redhead shrugged.

“Right now? I’m lookin’ for chocobo rustlers… same as you. Annie hired me on to give ya hand.”

Kai pinched the bridge of her nose, more confused than ever. “What?”

Reno snickered and hopped down from the large bolder he’d stepped out onto, so that he was finally on level ground with her, and handed her retrieved weapon back.

“It was the only way I could get her to tell me where the hell you were,” he explained, “Veld sent me to look for you. We’ve been worried about you.”

“How in Shiva’s name did you know to look here?” she asked, thoroughly mystified.

“Rude,” her fellow Turk replied, with another shrug and no further explanation, as if the answer were obvious. Which… it really probably should have been. Kai rolled her eyes. That figured. She’d been up near Fort Condor not long ago on a small escort job. The nosy intelligence specialist probably had a contact or two there who’d spotted her. If they’d seen what direction she’d come from – and subsequently left in – it wouldn’t have taken too much effort to put two and two together and figure out she was at Ferryport… or at least in the general vicinity of the tiny village.

“So where’s Tseng?” she sighed, knowing for certain that, if his protege was here, her old friend was almost certainly here, too. Reno smirked.

“Hopefully at home in bed,” he snickered, “He’s fightin’ off his annual winter death cold. ‘Course, it’s Tseng, so if his fever’s finally down, he probably dragged his ass into the office anyway.”

Kai chuckled softly. That… was a distinct possibility. Tseng was, after all, the dictionary definition of a workaholic. Laying around in bed all day never had been something he was fond of. The smile slowly faded from Reno’s face and he took on a more serious expression.

“Where the hell ya been Kai?” he asked, “You’ve been gone for months… No calls. No postcards. Hell, ya coulda sent up a smoke signal or somethin’, at least.”

“I…” she began, only to sigh and shake her head, “I had a lot to think about.”

And that was no lie. She had been thinking about a lot of different things in the time she’d been gone. The Zenshou. What had happened in Costa del Sol. Her family. Alyssa. Things she didn’t really want to think long and hard on, but had no other choice.

“So… ya come to any conclusions?”

“A few,” she said, guardedly, “And… we’ll talk about them. But right now, I’m on the job. And, I guess… so are you.”

The redhead huffed, but obligingly dropped the subject.

“Okay… so ya find ’em yet?” he asked.

“Not quite,” Kai answered, “Their tracks were covered up by the wind and snow from this point on. I was just about to start looking for other trail signs when you showed up. I don’t think they’re far, though. They were careful about covering their tracks immediately after they left the ranch, but for the last half mile or so, the trail’s been a lot more obvious. We’re probably near their camp, past the point where they’re worried about anyone following them.”

Reno shrugged. “Well… this is your area of expertise. Lead the way.”

“Hmph… forgotten all of your survival training already?” she gently teased him. The younger Turk snorted, exhaling a plume of steam in the icy air.

“I managed to follow your tracks, didn’t I?”

“I wasn’t trying to hide my tracks,” Kai deadpanned, “A first-day rookie could have followed my trail out here.” She shook her head, and started off, only to pause after a few steps. Reno very nearly walked directly into her, her halt was so abrupt. Kai turned back to face him and pulled him into a tight hug. “I missed you, Baby Turkling,” she whispered. Reno’s arms wrapped around her in response.

“I missed you, too.”

---

Half an hour later, Reno found himself crouched in a patch of scrubby, leafless bushes on a steep, snowy hillside. Between the rocky terrain and the seasonal weather, cover was scarce, but they’d managed to find something to keep them at least partially hidden from their targets.

“What’s the play here?” the redhead asked, keeping his voice down. Not that anyone but Kai was likely to hear him over the wind. It had picked up again, and its icy sting was becoming more than a little unpleasant. He knew how he’d do this. Separate, circle around on either side, and flank them. There were four of them… two for each Turk. More than manageable, even head on, but the slope and the deep snow was going to add some extra challenge to the take down. Best to play it safe and catch them unaware from two different directions.

Kai glanced over at him. “Straight down slope. Hit ’em hard and fast, before they even know what’s happening. I’ll take the two by the tent. You take the ones by the chocobo pen.”

Reno mentally sighed. He should have known. Kai always preferred the direct approach, even when it would potentially make the task more difficult. Personally, he was more a fan of working smarter rather than harder. But this was technically her job… he was just here to help out where needed.

The four men down below them looked like they were getting ready to pack up and move on. One was loading supplies onto an absolutely massive ebony chocobo, while another was putting bridles on the other two birds… one a much smaller animal with snow white feathers, and the other larger – but no where near as big as the black bird – with shimmering gold feathers. Reno had never seen a golden chocobo before. They were supposedly incredibly rare, and even he, with his blatant dislike of the creatures, could understand why they were so prized. The chocobo was breathtakingly beautiful.

If he’d had to guess… they’d got what they wanted, and were getting ready to get the hell outta Dodge with their loot. If Annie had waited much longer to hire on a mercenary, they’d have probably been long gone by the time anyone made it out here.

“On three,” Kai declared, and he saw that she already had her knives in hand. Reno pulled his sidearm from its holster, opting for a ranged attack rather than using his EMR. It seemed the better choice, in this case, given that they were starting from such a great distance and almost immediately dropping the element of surprise. “One… two…” she began, “Three!”

The pair darted from their meager cover and charged down the slope. Kai took one out straight away with a well-placed throw that sent a razor-sharp blade into his gut, and Reno knocked down a second with a bullet to the thigh. Not fatal, but enough to immobilize both men.

Near the bottom, the slope grew steeper, and Reno suddenly realized that it was going to be a problem. Soon. Between the snow and the speed of his descent, his footing on the slanted surface was already tenuous. As Kai hit her second target, his boot came down on pure ice, and he finally lost it, tumbling head over heals the remaining fifteen feet or so to the bottom and landing in a heap with a loud oomph. By the time he recovered, his second target was angrily running towards him.

“Fuck…” the redhead hissed, suddenly realizing that his gun had been knocked from his hand during the rather ungraceful landing. He reached for the EMR on his belt… but before he could even extend it, the thief halted in his tracks, and a moment later, he fell forward, face first, into the snow. It didn’t take Reno long to spot the blade protruding from the back of his neck. He cringed slightly. There was brutal, and then there was knife through the spinal cord brutal.

“Thanks,” he grudgingly allowed, nodding at the body as Kai made her way over to him. She smirked at him.

“Not exactly your most graceful attack…” she teased. Reno rolled his eyes.

“Shut up.”

And that was exactly why he would have preferred a sneak attack. Kai offered him a hand, helping him back to his feet. As he stood, he brushed the snow off of himself.

“So… that one’s dead. How are the other three?” he asked.

“Your guy’s fine aside from the hole in his leg. Two of mine are dead. The other… eh. He’ll live, but he’s not going to be rustling anymore chocobos anytime soon.”

“Great. Let’s load ’em up and get the hell outta here. We leave as soon as we drop these chocobos off with Annie, we can catch the ferry up to Junon and be back in Midgar by dinnertime.”

Kai paused, and eyed him for a moment, as if debating her next words. Finally, she sighed, shaking her head as snow began to fall around them, as yet another storm front moved in on the area.

“Reno…” she said, her voice quiet, but somehow strangely resigned and determined, “I’m… not going back with you.”

~end chapter 84~