Room 429, Late Afternoon

[raspberryturk]

"Permission to crawl under the bed and die, sir?" Phone calls. Phone calls were the worst idea that every freaking universe out there could possibly have come up with. Phone calls were going to be the death of Reno, one of these days. This phone call felt like it had the potential. Freaking phone calls.

Tseng smiled, faintly. "I take it you're back to yourself, then. Good. We need to speak, Reno."

What Reno wanted to say was "Fuck you you fucking fucker fuck fuck fuck."

What Reno did say was, "Yes, sir."

Tseng's smile disappeared, somewhat quickly. "Reno. I admit I took certain liberties with your condition. I imagine you're upset with me, and I can't say unfairly. However." The rest went unsaid. For now.

Deep breath. Right. Okay. Reno wasn't going to be able to fit through the receiver if he decided that he had to leap through to strangle his boss. Then again, this was Fandom... "However."

There was always a 'however,' wasn't there?

Tseng frowned. "However. I felt it was ... necessary, considering the lack of detail, in your recent reports." And certain omissions. That didn't need to be said, did it?

Reno closed his eyes. Right. That lurch in his gut there was totally normal. It was all good. He'd wash it down with something hard, after the phone call ended. "I can... Uh..." What? Explain? No, no, he probably couldn't.

Tseng waited a few seconds. He finally sighed. "Reno. I'm going to ask you for a full report. I understand you have a need for privacy. But I think the situation's changed. Has it not?"

Reno licked his lips. Shit, his mouth was dry. Maybe the boss wouldn't notice if he reached for that mouthful of Everclear he had left. Maybe. "... Yes, sir."

Tseng's voice softened, somewhat. "I trust you. Implicitly. You understand that."

"Yes, sir." Reno felt kind of like a busted record, here. Everything kept skipping. "She..." She was... "I'm not just tryin' to stay for her. This is still about the assignment, sir."

Tseng was still filing. "I believe you," he said. She. Reno went there first. Still taking notes, yes. "Can you start at the beginning? Your arrival. Friendships, allegiances. Anything you've omitted as being too ... fantastic to be believed."

Reno frowned. Oh. Oh shit. This was. Was going to take a while. And that meant that he wasn't getting a drink and he was going to be holding his breath for a long time. "Almost the whole damn place is too fantastic to be believed," he muttered. "I think only maybe about half the population of the island is even human. Place keeps throwing random crap at you when you don't expect it, gets to the point where you just shrug and go, 'oh, yeah. It's Fandom, yo." Talk about the place. The place was good. It wasn't... Wasn't telling Tseng about... The rest of it. That part that he almost touched on a moment before. Couldn't go there right now.

"I see." Tseng nodded. They could ease into this, sure. "By-product of the dimensional nexus, perhaps. Were you mentally affected this weekend, or were you really reverted to a child state in some manner?"

"I was freakin' five, sir." There was a good deal of frowning, here. The frowning was beyond epic. It was more of a scowl. "Kinda... me, but me at five, too. Was... weird."

Understatement of the day.

"And yet still yourself," Tseng mused. "You knew your identification number and the rest. I imagine Rude required some convincing, as well."

Rude. They were totally getting around to Rude, sooner or later.

Reno licked at his lips again. "Not much, sir."

Reno had a very unique level of annoying that Rude was able to pick up on. Rude was a pro at that sort of thing.

Tseng nodded. "Very well. You had a stalker-roommate - more oddities from the nexus, or the conventional variety? And a weekend where you said you weren't yourself at all. How did that differ from this?"

"Tamaki was just nuts, sir," Reno replied. ... Well, he was. "The weekend where I wasn't myself... I just wasn't. Was someone else, from somewhere else, never for a second thought some guy named Reno existed. This weekend, I was just me. But five."

"Were you someone else?" Tseng asked, carefully. "An imagined character, or someone that other people knew and might recognize? I suppose you may have no way of knowing."

Reno swallowed. "I was someone real," he said. "Three kids from here knew the guy." He left that one hanging. Didn't want to go too far into detail about lighting the roof on fire.

"And while you were him, you had no memory of your own experiences and life, correct?" Tseng asked. Dimensional nexus. This was fascinating.

"None. Looked like him, thought like him, could do whatever he could do. Just... was him, zoto." This was stupid.

There were two points left, and Tseng was fully expecting Reno to be reluctant to discuss either. Tseng chewed his lip in silence for a few moments.

"The angels," he said, finally.

Reno grit his teeth. Right. The angels. Right. So. There were these statues.

"There were these statues. And... You got the report. I dunno. Couldn't just... leave it be." He couldn't. Tseng had to know that, right?

"Couldn't?" Tseng asked. Lightly. Carefully.

Maybe Tseng would hear Reno flinch, there. Reno hoped he wouldn't.

"Was them or me," he said. Which was... really a huge fucking lie. Tseng had to know that. Reno sighed and tried again. "Was them or... Look, they just. Freakin' took off with people. Whole place was a clusterfuck and there's no way you can stay outta that kinda shit."

"You expressly disobeyed a direct order," Tseng said. Calmly.

"Yes," Reno replied. "I did." And what was Tseng going to do about it? There was that edge in Reno's voice that asked just that. He did something that had to be done. 'Sit this round out and hide like a fuckin' pussy while your girlfriend's crying' wasn't an option. .... Oh.

"I'm familiar with how you work," Tseng said. Still calm. "You've gone against directives in the past. It usually ends up saving another Turk's life."

Reno relaxed slightly at that. Slightly.

"Weren't no other Turks involved," he stated.

"I know," Tseng said. "That was somewhat my point."

Reno hated it when Tseng made 'somewhat' points.

"Jus' get to the point, already," he said, trying his best not to hiss that phrase out and add a few colorful bits of the English language to it.

"There aren't any Turks on that island," Tseng said sharply. "There are damn few of you left. Your loyalties and allegiances lie here, first. Disobeying direct orders to keep underlings alive is one thing. Risking yourself for your neighbors is another."

"Rikku ain't just a fucking neighbor, Tseng, or Rom-" Reno winced again. Great. Drop more names to the boss. Freaking brilliant. Damn it damn it damn it. "Got a few people here worth disobeyin' orders for." Asshole.

Damn it.

"I see," Tseng said. Frowning. Audibly.

He waited. Usually if he waited, Reno would continue.

"Yeah, I bet you do." Reno was frowning back. Not nearly as audibly. Perhaps the middle finger that he was aiming somewhere toward the causeway would be more audible. "Trust me except when you don't, yo, Tseng? Had to get involved. And stayed out of it until there was no," well, not as much, "risk that it'd go sour."

And his girlfriend had put up her hand, too.

Reno had to recognize that loud exhale by now. That was Tseng keeping his temper, forcibly.

"I trust you, as far as I can. I trust you with the lives of our associates. When you begin putting yourself in danger for the sake of something not relevant to the mission, that upsets me."

"Not a hell of a lot of a mission if the whole island gets sent back to 1899," Reno shot back. "If I'm not gonna get up the balls to walk backward and blink, who the hell is? Gonna leave it until it's me keepin' my eyes open with tape while four statues all try to eat me at once, Tseng?"

"Then you call Rude, he picks you up, and you come home," Tseng said sharply. "No mission is worth us losing yet another Turk."

"Funny how I'm still here," Reno snarled into the phone. He was angry because Tseng was right. And wrong. And. And. "I'm still here and everyone who was taken is back. Pretty fucked up world I'm in, when the people who go missing actually come back."

"Did you know they would come back?" Tseng asked coolly. "Did you know there was no risk, to yourself?"

"Wakin' up every morning's got risk to it, zoto." Reno's own voice had gone equally cool. To that place with the dark edge. The one he probably shouldn't reserve for his boss. "You can't honestly think otherwise. We wake up every mornin', don't matter what we got planned for the day. I was fuckin' careful, Boss. Trust my partner with my life." And then, because he had to say it. Couldn't leave well enough alone. "Wasn't gonna end up like Cissnei and the others."

There was a long, cold silence.

"There is a difference," Tseng said, finally, "between the average risks we take, on missions, and you pig-headedly involving yourself in a rescue mission which I expressly forbade you from joining. There is a difference between dying on a mission and dying because you are too short-sighted to remember where your loyalties lie. There is a difference between Cissnei," and the name sounded harsher for the flinch that went with it, "and how we would have lost you. Had your partner not been as reliable as you're presuming."

"I trust her just as much as I trust any Turk," Reno hissed. "This ain't about questioning my loyalties. This is about doin' somethin' that had to be done. Got my fill of sortin' out my loyalties a year an' some change ago, Boss."

Another silence. A cold one, while Tseng kept himself from saying anything more than would be prudent.

"So this is about her," he said, finally.

Very suddenly, the anger that Reno had been swallowing back surged forward, feeling more like bile and nausea and puke. It felt like fucking puke.

"I'm still a Turk," he said, and the bottle that he'd been tempted to open was thrown across the room, because that was a better idea than throwing the phone. "I'm still a Turk and I'm still standin', and you wanna question my loyalty because of this, Tseng, then you go right the fuck ahead."

"Should I?" Tseng asked harshly. "A few people worth disobeying orders. Wasn't that what you said a minute ago? You're still a Turk. And now there are people who you'd rank higher than your own mission. Ones you never bothered to tell me about."

"You wanna tell me what to do some more, Tseng? I'll do it. I've followed orders from you. Followed orders from Verdot before you. Followed fucking orders from here to hell and back. You want to tell me to get my ass out there and press-gang some more dumb fucks into SOLDIER, an' I'll do it. You got someone you need dirt on? I'll get it. You want someone dead, Tseng? You got someone that's gotta die today? You wanna give me some more goddamn orders? I can do it! I do do it! You can tell me to go out there and drop another motherfucking plate--" Reno's voice cracked. He flinched. He took a breath. Shut his eyes and oh fuck. Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck he didn't want to take this here. He went quiet. Barely heard the words as he said them, himself. "... I'll do it. I'll drop another fucking plate for the Turks. But you can't ask me to let those people stay dead."

The plate. Tseng was pinching the bridge of his nose again. He didn't want to talk about the plate. Didn't want to remember that time. AVALANCHE back and the President gone mad, three Turks left, go kidnap that Ancient (Aerith, Aerith, she had a name, damn it) and while you're at it, bring the plate on down. That would show them.

Tseng had said yes, sir. As you wish, sir. Because that was what the Turks did.

Tseng hated this job some days. They all did.

Tseng exhaled. Slowly. "I see," he said.

"I'll fucking do it," Reno said again, and he believed it. Knew it. Was what he was. Wasn't anything else, was there? "I'll do it. You give me the orders. I do 'em. 'S... how this works, zoto."

The fight in Reno's voice was gone. Reno wanted to gather up the pieces of the bottle and maybe suck the Everclear from the carpet and curl up somewhere and he was better than that. Fucking better than that. He was a Turk. He was a Turk.

"But I ain't gonna let anything happen to the people here, either."

"I'll need dossiers," Tseng said. Calmly. "The important figures, on this island. Both public concern and any you might find to be relevant."

Translation: I want to know who runs the island. And I want to know about your friends.

Reno nodded. Slowly. Tseng probably couldn't hear his nod. Reno was barely aware that he was doing it. He had a voice, somewhere in there. Would just... take him a moment to find it, is all. Just take a moment. "Yes, sir."

Translation: I'm a Turk. We complete the mission no matter what. Because we're Turks.

Tseng nodded. Dammit. He didn't like this mission. Was liking it less as time went on. But he had orders, too.

"Very well, then," he nodded. "Your next report is due Friday."

"Yes, sir." Reno nodded again. "Friday, you'll have a report, sir."

Unless I become a kid before the weekend, or turn into someone else, or get eaten by stone angels.

Tseng nodded. "Dismissed." And hung up his phone, and frowned at it for a very long time.

Cissnei. Aerith. Meteor falling. Sector seven, lying crushed under its plate. And all the Turks who never came home.

Finally he lifted it again. "Rude. Report to my office immediately."

Reno stared at the phone. Shut it. Stared at it some more.

Dropped it on the floor.

Walked over to his wastepaper basket.

And threw up.

He was fine.


[Preplayed with the astounding the_merriest, who continues to be an awesome Tseng. Similarly, the post is open only to the non-Tseng version of the same, if you please.]

Comments

[raspberryturk]

"I'm stayin," Reno answered, giving a shrug of his shoulders. "Gotta get some paperwork outta the way, is all."

Dossiers. Words did not express how much Reno didn't want to go near those with a ten-foot pole.

"Tseng ain't a bad Boss." There was definite emphasis on the word 'boss.' "Just doesn't want to lose any more Turks."

For good reason. Granted. Didn't make Reno any less pale, right now, as he stared at the phone on the floor.

[the_merriest]

"You said that, before," she said, sitting down carefully on the bed opposite his. "Something ... happened, to some of the Turks, yeah? It makes sense. I mean. That he'd be ... protective."

A warm, nurturing boss, who sent Reno out to hurt people. Right. Made total sense, right there.

[raspberryturk]

"Dangerous job," he muttered. "You get your head around it all. I mean. When you wake up to it every day, zoto. People don't come home. It's part of the job."

He shut his eyes and took a deep breath, bound and determined to swallow it down. "One thing when it's on the job, I guess. Can run bloody mayhem all around Midgar, so long as it's on orders."

Could. Before the rest of Midgar joined Sector Sev--

"He'll cool down. Ain't an issue."

[the_merriest]

"He's ... mad?" Rikku asked, hesitantly. "Because he thinks you're ... doing dangerous stuff here? Not the dangerous stuff you're, uh. Supposed to be doing."

She was a little unclear on what that was, exactly, but that was okay. Right?

[raspberryturk]

"I got involved in the mess with the angels," Reno replied. "Puttin' myself at... unnecessary risk."

He sighed and shook his head, running his hands (oh shit, they were shaking) through his hair before placing them behind himself on his bed.

Again. He was fine.

"He gave me orders not to get involved, zoto."

[the_merriest]

"Oh." She pulled one of her knees up onto the bed with her, hugging it against her chest. "I didn't ... know. Is that why ... you weren't checking your texts? Because you were ... breaking the rules and they were gonna get mad?"

[raspberryturk]

He smiled weakly and lifted a shoulder slightly.

"Can't break an order you ain't never seen," he answered. And then the smile was gone again. "Questioned my judgment. My loyalty to the Turks. Conversation got... bad. He needs more info than I've been givin' him."

Or I get pulled.

The floor would be far better to look at if his phone wasn't sitting there on it.

[the_merriest]

"More ... info?" Rikku considered that for a few seconds. "I can get more Blessed Gems. It's ... hard, but it's not impossible. I'm ... sorry if he ... thinks your judgment is ..."

She shook her head. "You had to help. It was driving you crazy, not helping."

[raspberryturk]

Reno licked his lips. So damn dry...

"He wants to know who I'm lettin' get close to me," he managed. "Who was worth riskin' my life for."

[the_merriest]

"Oh." It sounded hollow. Felt even more so. "It wasn't ... I mean. Like that. Was it? Because ... it was everybody. The whole island. That was ..."

She closed her eyes. "Is this where you tell me that ... we, uh. Can't ... ?"

[raspberryturk]

"Not on your life," he said quickly, looking up at her and trying to look less upset than he actually was. Fine. Fine. Fine. See? Fine.

"Not gonna tell you that. Tseng can't order me to stop c-caring. Just... Means he's gotta know more than what he got out of me yesterday, when I was five, and he was actin' like my best freakin' friend."

Maybe she could hear the venom in that last part.

[the_merriest]

"Oh, ouch." She bit her lip again. "That's not fair. So he ... so ..."

Deep breath. "What does this mean, then?"

[raspberryturk]

"Means he wants me to write up dossiers on everyone who matters to me," Reno muttered, and he shut his eyes and pressed his hand against his forehead and focused on breathing for a moment.

He didn't want this to become ShinRa's business. But property of ShinRa was always ShinRa's business. Right. And being a Turk...

Occasionally expendable property, but property.

[the_merriest]

The word settled funny in her stomach. Dossiers. Files. Tracking them. Right. Because.

Rikku took a deep breath and asked the one thing she'd been trying not to, for a very long time.

"Reno? ... Why does an ... electric company ... have a ... covert ops squad?"

There was no good reason. So.

Who did he work for, really?

[raspberryturk]

Swallow it. There was that bile again, in his chest, in his throat. Swallow it.

Breathe. Look at her. Just... Look at her and breathe.

Find your voice.

Tell her.

"ShinRa isn't just an electric power company, zoto."

[the_merriest]

"No," she said quietly.

Secret files. Dossiers. Covert ops. Paperwork. The public face, the pretty one, and all the low-down nasty shit you never let on you did.

"You work for the government."

She finally, finally looked up.

"Don't you?"

[raspberryturk]

He held her gaze there for a moment, those green eyes that drove him insane when he was totally fine, and now that he wasn't they were so much worse.

Couldn't keep looking at them. At her. The floor.

Look at the floor.

The phone was on the floor.

Look at your lap.

Hands of a murderer sitting in your lap.

Look at her eyes again. Answer her.

"Yeah."

[the_merriest]

Rikku jumped up, folding her arms tightly around herself and trying like hell not to scream. Not to cry. Not to. Not to.

"Wonderful," she said in a choked voice. "Here. L-lemme help, zoto. With that whole dossier."

Secret files, secrets and lies, conspiring with the Al Bhed, the Guado take care of Guado affairs, Lady Yuna's not a traitor, that was just a rumor spread by the Al Bhed, only the power of death rules in Spira, I've been traveling with a heathen, the likes of her aren't welcome in this hallowed place, around and around and --

"Rikku of the Al Bhed tribe. Age 16. Two summers ago, was arrested for treason, conspiring with the Al Bhed, and causing grievous bodily harm to a Maester. Was sentenced to death. Was supposed to be executed but they sucked at executions. I guess 'sucked' isn't a very official, government sort of word for your report, huh? You'll have to pretty this up a bit. I'm sure you're used to that." Her tone was vicious and she couldn't help it, dammit, the flood of words wouldn't stop.

"Responsible - with others, also traitors and blah blah blah - for the death of one Seymour Guado, Maester of Yevon - that means big important government official, so that gets a big red flag next to it. Last known address, before Fandom Island, would be the airship Fahrenheit, as Seymour Guado and his underlings invaded her Home city on Bikanel Island and b-burned it to the ground." Her voice wasn't shaking, there. It was a figment of your imagination. She wasn't weak fucking dammit. "Subject also survived that event, which was every bit as fun as it sounds. Navigating through the bodies ... to f-find ..."

She closed her eyes. Hold it the fuck together, Rikku, no crying here, no crying now, stop it.

[raspberryturk]

He didn't move, except for that flinch.

He didn't breathe. Didn't look away as the color seemed to drain from his face. Didn't blink or speak or function at all until she was finished.

Except for that flinch.

And then he pulled himself to his feet again. And then he tried to find his voice, his breath, his pulse and his mind.

"Rikku, please, I..."

Didn't have any excuse for this. At all.

[the_merriest]

"You knew," she said quietly. She was shaking, now, holding it all in. "You've known the whole time. H-how I feel. What they did to us. You lied to me. Didn't you?"

[raspberryturk]

"I'm not them," he said, feebly. "I didn't... do that. To your people."

...

Which didn't clear his conscience in the least.

"I've done a lot of things I can't take back. But what the Yevonites did to the Al Bhed, that ain't on my head."

[the_merriest]

"Did you, or didn't you?" she snapped. "Is that why you've never told me? Hey, it just never came up? You had no idea I'd react like this, you're so shocked! Except you don't look shocked at all. You look like someone just punched you."

Funny, because she felt the same way, herself.

[raspberryturk]

Trying to be numb. Trying to put his head in that place where his head had to be to do his missions. But this wasn't a mission. Wasn't a bunch of faceless nothings who he could drink away every night before trying to sleep. Wasn't AVALANCHE wasn't Sector Seven wasn't the end of the world only felt like it and numb...

Numb was so far gone that he'd just hurt himself more pretending he could reach it.

"Wanted to. Said... you wouldn't... wouldn't like it..."

Wasn't good enough! Wasn't fucking good enough!

[the_merriest]

"You lied to me," she said, again. "Because you knew, if I knew the truth, I'd be mad."

It felt like a knife wound. Felt like a slap in the face. Felt like felt like felt like --

"You must think I'm so stupid," she seethed. "You were just ... never gonna tell me? Not gonna stick around long enough for it to matter? You --"

-- like he'd never meant any of it, at all.

[raspberryturk]

"Wasn't that. Wasn't that. Isn't that. It's. I couldn't." Breathing wasn't supposed to be this hard. It wasn't supposed to feel like someone had a choke-hold on him, like someone had dug their hand into his chest, like he was standing on the ceiling upside-down so that his guts were filling his brain with rocks.

Where had his guts found rocks?

"I want to stay, want to not have this matter, zoto. Didn't want..."

So thirsty.

"I didn't want you to know. Because if you knew..."

I can't lose you.