raspberryturk | Edge, Thursday Evening

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Edge, Thursday Evening

"I'm friggin' bored," Reno announced, possibly to nobody in particular, possibly to the bowl of beans that he'd picked. "Bored bored bored."

The beans said nothing.

"You know how bored I am?"

The beans waited patiently for a reply.

"I'm so friggin' bored, I'm talkin' to string beans."

This was what happened when Reno got himself suspended from duty for two weeks.

Fear.

[NFB for distance, as usual, but totally open for phone calls!]

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"It's handled," Reno noted. "She ain't to talk about anything after the minute she's livin' in with the kid. Scarin' the shit outta her was good. Got her to come to me an' sort out the rest. She can keep breathin' tomorrow, Elena. Just keep an eye on her, alright? She's part of that kid's support system, too, from the sound of it."

It felt weird, analyzing one of his rookies to another one. Picking her apart as a liability. Trying to figure out what was safe, and what might end the world.

"I'll be watching," Elena said. She didn't need to add that she didn't trust this girl, and didn't like a third party throwing a wrench into the mix. "I backed off. But if it comes out that I need to take further action, I will."

This girl was a friend of his, apparently. So she'd only threatened. But she wouldn't let that friendship keep her from doing her job, if it came to that. Too much was at stake.

"You do the job," Reno agreed.

Turk creed, right there. And all he figured he needed to say, on the matter.

"How've other things been goin', out there?"

"It's bizarre trying to sum up my week," Elena admitted. "I've been puppy-sitting for a fellow student -- not his puppy, but him. I had five dates in fifteen minutes, and got two of them to blush. I had a spa day yesterday, which I had to interrupt with scaring off some girl who was just there for a mani-pedi. And I got you suspended, which I don't think I actually apologized for. You may commence bitching at me for that one."

"I'm disappointed in you, Rookie. You only got two of--"

Waaaitaminute.

"That was YOU?"

Dammit.

"I e-mailed Tseng to tell him he didn't thank me, for the strip-o-gram," she sighed. "He yelled at me for encouraging you, and I said, hell, I didn't just encourage you, I paid you. Then suddenly he said you were on suspension. Probably because he can't suspend me."

Playing everyone against one another was surprisingly effective, in a loyal environment.

"I tried to remind him that it wasn't fair, to punish you instead of me, and he just got all RAWR NONE OF YOU RESPECT ME."

Pause. Okay. Going to admit the rest. Even if it hurt.

"... and talked about ... you know. Replacing me."

"He can't replace you, Rookie. Trust me on that one. He's an ass, but he ain't that much of an ass."

A pause.

"An' I kinda wanna see Tseng get all, 'Rawr,' like that. I'd probably piss myself laughin'."

Seriously.

Elena was now going to forward him the chain of e-mails (http://findingelena.livejournal.com/3599.html?thread=89615#t89615), starting with her own calling it a strip-o-gram.

"I bet I could get him to growl. He was pretty pissed off when I said you wouldn't blow him under his desk," she said. As innocently as she could manage. Which wasn't, very.

Reno was going to be a moment before replying, here. Because he was busy reading the long descent into hell that had lead to him being suspended for two weeks.

"Man, Rookie. You two don't even speak the same English, do you?"

He was laughing. A little. Yes.

One week. He'd managed the second all by himself.

"We don't," she said, with a sigh. "We start off here and veer over there and next thing you know, we're arguing."

So it never would have worked, anyway. Between them. Not like she still cared about that. Much.

"They gotta make a dictionary or somethin'. Speakin' Tseng for Dummies. They wouldn't make a hell of a lot of money offa a title like that, but it'd be handy anyhow, yo."

Reno was rife with brilliant ideas, see?

"They'd have to find someone to write it," Elena reminded him. "Someone who actually spoke Tseng. That'd be the hard part."

She'd buy a copy. She'd buy three.

"I think Rude speaks Tseng," Reno mused. "An' I speak fluent Rude. There might be somethin' lost in translation if we gotta pass it down the line so much, but it's better'n nothin', yo."

"So, all Tseng and I would need would be for you and Rude to come along on a date," she sighed. "I mean, in the insane alternate universe where, somehow, Tseng and I are dating, which might as well be one where people have green horns or something."

"You been goin' to Fandom how long, Elena?"

Look, this was just Reno saying, in his own special way, that people with green horns were totally possible.

"Keep tryin', Rookie. You never know, he might crack yet."

And so, apparently, was her ending up with Tseng. At least, Reno thought so.

"I wish we could help," she said. "He's stressed out, and I quit, and -- I really do think he needs some serious R&R, but he's not going to ever take it."

"He ain't, no," Reno sighed. "He's probably tryin' to take up my job right now, while I'm sittin' on my ass countin' out fertilizer pellets for radishes."

How exciting.

Elena drummed her fingers idly on her desk. "There's a break week coming up," she said. "Maybe I come back, lend a hand. On the condition that he pulls you off suspension."

See? She was a helpful Rookie like that.

"You figure he'd go for that?" Reno paused. Laughed a little. "I'm willin' to bet he won't be so convinced I'm bein' punished when I up an' take off to Disneyland this weekend."

She could ask him what a Disneyland was. It was okay. He'd had to ask, too.

"Why, exactly, would Tseng have to know?" she asked, grinning. "Tell him you're coming here, to help me out with something important. Or helping your girlfriend rescue children from a burning building."

Pause.

"What's a Disneyland?"

"It's kinda like the Gold Saucer of Earth, but bigger an' with less gamblin'," Reno replied, as though he actually knew what he was talking about.

Everything he needed to know about Disneyland, he knew from Romeo. And the internet. And the internet was always right, right?

"Instead of chocobos, people dress up like mice, I guess. I dunno what's so great about mice. You can't race 'em, can you?"

"Gold Saucer, good, no gambling, bad," Elena mused. "Maybe they race mice. People around here do some weird things."

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Edge, Thursday Evening

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