raspberryturk | Office #7, Tuesday

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Office #7, Tuesday

So, Reno really hadn't been here at all this semester, with a couple of exceptions. It stood to reason, with him, that almost a week before his final class was probably a good time to make an attempt at that.

Not that there was a hell of a lot of paperwork to be done, what with all of the hard work finished with back in Edge. Tseng had been more or less off his case the whole semester, which was nothing shy of a miracle. They weren't exactly going to be able to start anything new next week, and how the hell did you even give a final exam about public service, anyway? So mostly he was in his office because it felt as though he should be in his office, and as for doing actual office work?

Did drinking coffee and flinging pencils up at the ceiling until they stuck up there count?

[OOC: Open office hours! Probably Reno's last for a long, long while.]

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"That's right," Zack said, grinning over Reno's head right back at Aerith. "You guys are doing our work for us, so we can actually afford to take time off. You brought this on yourself."

It was also Reno's own fault because Turks were just fun to tease. That was just how it was. Sorry, Reno.

"So, to say thank you, you... flooded my office."

Reno was not following your crazy dead person logic, here.

You meant sorry-not-sorry, Reno, Zack. That's what you meant.

"Exactly!" Aerith said, because the logic was perfectly sound to her. "And we were curious about where you kept popping off to, especially since you've been bringing a bunch of kids around lately."

Of course they'd noticed that.

"Yeah, well, Edge needed water. More water than that muddy puddle in the church you're so fond of," Reno mumbled. "Seemed worth makin' a project out of it, yo. Did some gardening while we were at it. I'm thinkin' Edge would be real appreciative if you'd let some useful plants grow along with all them flowers of yours."

Aww, lookit the little Turk, trying to atone!

Crankily!

Edited 2014-12-02 13:50 (UTC)

For the first time, Aerith's smile faded into something a rather more serious.

"We're trying," she said. "But there's not much life in Edge yet, and flowers always came more easily to me. As the flowers die, there will be a little more life in the soil, slowly but surely. It's going to take time."

Aerith leaned forward, towards Reno. "We really do appreciate your help. It's going to do a lot of good! It already is, even, but it's going to be a while longer before the ground is viable for much more than flowers."

Reno sighed as he leaned back in his chair (with another squelch), thinking back on the work Karla had done with Aerith years ago in the church. He could see improvement in little ways all over, but the going was slow, and people were still suffering, and, so help him, he was going to take his frustration out somewhere.

Probably on himself, later. What the hell did he really expect the dead to do to fix the problems of the living?

"Should'a stuck with beans, is what you're sayin'," Reno muttered.

Aerith couldn't actually smack Reno, but she leaned over and swatted at his head anyway.

"Don't be ridiculous," she scolded. "The beans were helpful, and if you want to grow more, we'll do our best to help, but water is just as important and you know all the reasons why."

"Right," Zack agreed, giving a little grin in spite of himself at the shiver that was clearly running down Reno's spine at the sensation of being swatted by a ghost. "Really, a Turk of all people should know there's only so much we can do. We figured that's why you were helping so much in the first place. We get a lot of prayers, you know, from the living, asking the Planet to change its mind and heal those places that... you know... we broke. You never send any."

The 'we,' in this case, was referring pretty exclusively to ShinRa. There was a certain note in it that was unmistakable for anything else.

"If you start sitting around and blaming yourself and everyone else for everything tough in the world, nothing gets done. And... you know... then you're kind of acting like an old friend of ours."

Cloud.

"Eugh," Reno muttered, reaching up to fix his hair, even though the swat hadn't even done anything to that. The rain had been worse for it, really. "Gods no. Anyway, it ain't like I'm expectin' results overnight or anything. That is why we're workin' so hard in Edge right now. I ain't even gonna think about Mideel and other places that got it hard before that rock came down, there are problems everywhere."

The 'we fucked up' was unspoken. But pretty clear.

"The water's a start. Wasn't my idea, though. I just decided to bring in some outside help, and the rookies did the rest."

"Thank them for us," Aerith said, "if you haven't already. It makes our work go a little easier, every bit that you and your rookies do." Then she smiled. "Mideel has grass growing now," she shared. "Not much and not everywhere, but it's starting."

It had been easier there, with the Lifestream so close to the surface, to begin the repairs and have the improvements be visible ones.

"They're gettin' a party next week, after we check in with Tuesti and his toy cat," Reno replied, now setting himself to work trying to wring some of the water from the bottom of his jacket. "The locals are pretty damn thankful to 'em, too."

To them. The weird outsider kids who came in to help get Edge going again. Not so much to him, the obvious Turk who lurked around the edges and helped whenever he could get in without being too disruptive to the locals. They'd really much rather he'd died in Meteorfall.

"... Glad it'll help."

"It will," Aerith confirmed, smiling again. Partly at the fact that he was sodden.

It amused her.

"And even if the locals aren't grateful to you, we appreciate it," she said. "Even if you do look pretty silly right now!"

"Ugh," Reno replied, eloquently. "That's one stupid way to show you're thankful, yo. You got anything else you wanna say or soak here today?"

Reno apparently had little patience for soggy hauntings.

"It would serve you right if we stuck around all day!" Aerith laughed and hopped off his desk, clasping her hands behind her back as she sauntered past the front of it. "But no, I think we're done."

Then she paused.

"Well, I suppose there's two more things," she said. "The first is that you might want to make sure your students don't set foot in Edge alone! That's dangerous for them."

"Well, yeah, no shit," Reno replied, blinking. "I mean, I told 'em no wandering off on their own, yoto."

...

"S'one of the rules. That apparently one of 'em broke?"

Welp. Reno was going to have to get angry at somebody, now.

"Yes," Aerith said, bobbing her head. She felt sorry for the kid who was going to get in trouble but not enough to not tell on them.

Edge was dangerous.

"I don't know her name," she added, a bit apologetic. "But she has longish brown-blonde hair."

... Once upon a time, that would have been any one of Reno's Rookies, really.

"She ain't one of the two I have workin' as my direct assistants, is she?"

Because that seemed like the best bet, there, Karina.

"You know," Aerith said thoughtfully, "I think she is."

"I'm gonna kill'er," Reno muttered, his expression going a little darker. "I'm gonna friggin'..."

Right then and there, he pulled his phone out of his pocket. Turk PHS systems were water resistant, so there, Aerith. And right then and there, he called Karina's phone and left a message.

He was not a happy Turk.

"Don't actually kill her," Aerith advised, not quite entirely seriously. She didn't really think he'd kill her, after all. If she did, she'd be more concerned. "You might regret it when you're less angry."

Edited 2014-12-02 17:53 (UTC)

"I'm not going to actually kill her," Reno muttered. "Probably."

That depended on a lot of factors, like how badly he actually wanted to be able to ever come back to the island again once this semester was through, and how much danger Karina put the other students in while he was bird-shaped.

"Try not to," she said agreeably, did another back-and-forth by his desk and then, with a glance at Zack, said, "Did you want to hear the other thing? Or should we leave you to seethe?"

Reno ground his teeth one more time for good measure, and then sighed and shrugged his shoulders, slumping into his chair.

"Whatever. Why not? Ain't every day I get visited by dead people. Might as well spit it out now, yo."

"It's not a very complicated thing," she said, stopping and leaning one hip against the desk. "It's just, we'd be much obliged if you could pass on a message to Tseng for us."

Aerith glanced at Zack, who nodded at her, and then back at Reno.

"Just tell him this: we forgive him."

Reno actually took a moment to look between the two ghosts, back and forth in silence before sighing and shaking his head.

"Yeah," he muttered. "Yeah, I can pass that message on, yo."

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