raspberryturk | Room 429, Monday Evening

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Room 429, Monday Evening

Reno was going to sit on his bed and eye his cellphone. Dojima was right, really. If he couldn't understand the concept of giving people time, he should at least call Rude and tell him that he wasn't five anymore, and all reports for the time being would be typed up in a semi-sane manner.

And that would be why he was eying his phone.

He wasn't, however, reaching for it.

It was just fine where it was sitting. He could call Rude up any time, take the heat for getting him in crap with Tseng or whatever, and maybe he'd have things sorted out a little better by then. There were, after all, a lot of things to sort through.

Yeah. Yeah, he didn't have to pick up the phone after all. Save Rude the trouble. The big guy would appreciate it later.

[ooc: The door is open a crack, and the post is totally open for invasion from random persons. Oooooo.]

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"There's such a thing as more right." He shrugged a shoulder slightly and gave her another squeeze. "People should get to choose this kinda thing, yo. Not be expected to just march off and get themselves killed for somethin' that doesn't really work anyhow. Just one big freakin' circle, and damn if I don't wanna smack whoever decided that's how it's gotta be, zoto."

"But some of them did choose it," Rikku said, settling in and frowning. "And we were keeping them from it. I don't care, though. We were keeping them alive. I mean. It was better than ... maybe it wasn't. I don't know any more. It felt like something. Pops wasn't thinking at all. And I ... I was supposed to get Yunie? But her Guardians kinda beat me up."

She frowned. "She pulled me aside. And she said ... don't fight me. Help me. And I had a hundred reasons not to. I don't believe in any of this religious crap. I think you're killing yourself for nothing. I love you and I don't want you to die." Deep breath. "I mean, not to mention, you know. Nobody's gonna let me be a Guardian. I'm an Al Bhed. She kinda didn't care. 'I need you.' And that's all it took."

Reno was quiet for a long while, a frown on his lips.

"Family's family," he said at last, then bit his lip. "I mean, if it means somethin', then you can't just..."

He took another breath and shrugged faintly.

"Okay. So you joined her on her pilgrimage, zoto."

"I did," Rikku said. "That was ... after Mi'ihen. We skipped Mi'ihen, just now. Didn't skip it, really. I wasn't there. Wasn't allowed to go. I begged. I screamed. Pops locked me in my room. I've never seen him that mad."

"Mi'ihen went bad, didn't it?" She'd suggested it enough, Reno could put that much together. "Then it's good he kept you behind, zoto."

"The Crusaders. They ... were with Yevon, they fought to protect the cities. And the Chocobo Knights. And we Al Bhed, we found some really big old machina. Canons and things like that. So everyone joined up for Operation Mi'ihen. The Crusaders got excommunicated for it. Their families wouldn't talk to them. But they ... were going to lure Sin in and ambush it. With firepower and swords and the huge machina? Throw everything at it."

Talking about it, all this death, it made her so tired, suddenly.

"It was over fast. They found some survivors. Under the bodies. The Crusaders said it was the divine punishment of Yevon, for daring to go against the teachings. The Chocobo Knights were just three knights and a Chocobo."

He couldn't hold her close enough, now, couldn't possibly pull her tightly enough into his chest to make any of this better. But that didn't mean he wasn't going to try.

Her world didn't sound a heck of a lot better than his, at this point.

"That's... rough." There were better words than that, somewhere. Reno was going to have quite the time of it, trying to find them. "Things... probably didn't get much better after that, huh?"

"We had to cross the Thunder Plains," she said flatly, pulling his arms close again. "Huge area, nonstop storm. Then in Macalania, they wouldn't let me in the temple. Her kind isn't welcome here. And then we got in and found out Seymour was crazy and killing people and so we ... he was gonna hurt Yunie. We had to. We killed him. He was above the law, he was a Maester, there was nothing else we could do."

It still ate at her. It was like Luke's dad had said. She chose to take a life. It didn't just go away.

Ouch. Ouch. Lightning and more of that anti-Al Bhed crap, and then...

Ouch.

"You did what you had to," he murmured, leaning a little to rest his chin on her shoulder. "Doesn't make it easier, but if there wasn't a choice..."

"There was," she said. "There always is. That's what I've been yelling at you for, isn't it? He decided he was going to marry Yuna, and she agreed if he'd turn himself in. And he said he was just going to marry her anyway, and drag her off, and I was not going to let him touch her. And he said, well, if you're so eager to die, let's get to it."

Deep breath.

"Afterwards, the Guado, they ... they freaked out. We told them. He killed his own father. He was plotting and murdering and we had proof. They destroyed it. We were to stand trial for what we did. We ran, all the way back to the woods. We fell under the ice. Sin came, then. I woke up in the desert. Bikanel Island, where I grew up. Sin ... does that, sometimes. Carries people for miles and miles in its undertow."

Easier to talk about Sin than go on with her story.

She could take her story wherever she needed to, even if it boiled down to talking without touching on any of it at all, anymore. Reno would listen so long as she was talking, and he might listen longer, after all the talking was finished, too.

"Sounds like one hell of a trip," he said, softly.

"I said I'd take everyone to Home," she said, the words barely audible. "It's just this way. Promise you'll never tell. Who knows what the Yevonites would do if they found us. Past the cactuar stones, past the old storefront, over the hill and I screamed. Fires. Fiends. Bodies. Keyakku, running towards us, and a dual-horn knocking him down. I ran to him. 'Who's attacking us? Fru tet drec du oui?' He. He said 'Yevon,' and 'Guado,' and then he didn't say anything else."

Reno drew in a long, slow breath, his eyes closed, and if he just gently shifted their weights about a little he could rest his chin on her shoulder and lean his head sideways so that his cheek was pressed to hers, and maybe that would begin to be close enough. Maybe.

Not nearly, but maybe.

"I'm... sorry," he whispered.

There weren't words. And he was them. And maybe even if there were words, he wouldn't be someone who had any right to say them. But he could say that, because he couldn't just leave it silent.

His cheek against hers, his arms, warm and safe, and ... all of the horrors rushing back. The thick haze of smoke, the whine of the gears, corridors filled with fiends and bodies, and she couldn't stop, couldn't fold the arms and close the eyes, couldn't check to see if 'dead' was just 'injured', couldn't grab them and bring them along, because Home was crashing down and Yunie was in the Sanctum and her friends, her family, her tribe was lying dead around her.

Yuna gone, Dona and Isaaru sending the dead. Everything in ruins. Everything they had worked for. Everything they were.

She turned, sideways, sliding her arms around and settling in lower, face pressed against the curve of his neck. He wouldn't tell if her shoulders were trembling. He wouldn't tell if his neck got damp. He wouldn't tell if she let herself feel it, just once.

He wouldn't tell if she had to feel it. It was hers. Theirs, if she would let him share it. That's what they were doing right now, wasn't it? With his arms around her and her arms around him and with her feeling it right now- They were sharing it. He'd feel it too, or just let her pour it out against him, or be whatever it was that she needed.

Close. He would be close. And he would rub his thumb in little circles against her back, and close his eyes, and feel it too.

"I'm s-sorry," she managed. "Being stupid. I j-just ..."

She sat up a little, wiping at her eyes. "Got through all of it without being stupid like this. I did. I had to pull it together and get everyone underground and I did. I didn't stop to freak out or scream or cry all over things and then we were in the airship and Home was rubble and we had to go to Bevelle and I had to help fly it. There's no time to feel sorry for yourself. You just move on."

Edited 2008-04-10 08:48 (UTC)

"You aren't stupid," Reno said, his lips pulling into a frown again. "You're not. You stand when you gotta stand and do what you gotta do when you gotta do it, and there ain't nothin' stupid about any of that. It's..." He sighed and lifted a shoulder a little. "It's real strong, Rikku. Standin' like that. I don't think I could do it."

"You do," she said, frowning at him. "Why do you ... you're acting like you don't, but you do. You kinda square your shoulders anytime you say the word 'Turk.' It means something to you."

"It is me, when I'm not bein' an idiot and drownin' myself with whatever's hardest at the time," he replied, and shook his head a little, and sighed. "I mean that, though. That you're not just bein' stupid. It takes lotta guts to be that strong, yoto."

Rikku shook her head, pulling her knees against her. "There's more. But it's just ... the same stuff all over. The trial and Zanarkand and finding out Yevon was all a big lie and everyone knew it, and then saying we were gonna fix it this time without anybody dying and we messed that up, anyway. But it's so ..."

"Tiring," he offered, gently. "Like a freakin' storm that'll tear you apart if you can't outrun it, but after a while, the runnin's what might just do you in, instead."

He looked downward and shook his head.

"I think there's some kinda balance. Between runnin' and stoppin' to face the storm. Just takes a lot of lookin' to find it, zoto."

"I think maybe ..." Deep breath. "I'm done. For now. There's ... more to the story but I can't, just yet. If you ... if you really wanna hear it, I'll tell you another time. Okay?"

He nodded.

It was a heavy story. She didn't have to share any more than she had the heart to speak, and he wasn't going to push her for it.

"Whenever you're up to it, so am I," he assured her.

"Okay," she said. And she settled back against him.

Just for a few minutes. Just to sit here, and think.

He wouldn't mind, would he?

"Okay," he agreed, his arms tentatively moving around her waist again, his eyes staring upward at the ceiling, his lips pursed a little in thought.

A few minutes was just fine, for whatever she had to think about. He didn't mind.

Dork.

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Room 429, Monday Evening

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