Middle of Nowhere, Gaia, Saturday Night Fandom Time

[raspberryturk]

Reno stared at the little sphere in his hand, squinting hard at it. It had almost killed him to get this damn thing, this stupid fucking piece of doomsday that AVALANCHE - the real AVALANCHE - had been so hell-bent on getting their mitts on. And he hadn't told Tseng yet. Hadn't really told anybody but the Rookie.

He had a little piece of the end of the world, the beginning of the end of the Turks, right there in his hand. Shit, he was still bleeding on the damn thing. Or maybe that blood belonged to the Ravens he'd taken down to get it.

AVALANCHE would notice it was missing before long. They'd send someone to investigate and they'd find blood and footprints and the telltale smoke and ozone smell of thundaga in the air. And he'd be long gone by the time that happened. He looked down at the corpse of the Raven on the ground. He spat on it as the body began to fade.

And then he picked up his phone and placed two calls. One to Portalocity, telling them to send a portal to a location that was a good ten minutes away on foot, if he ran like hell. And, as he was running like hell, he placed a second call.

Now the mission was out of his hands and over to Iris.

[OOC: For one!]

Comments

[raspberryturk]

"Shit," Reno replied, still kind of blinking, but walking a good lap around her just to take in the details. "You just raised the bar, Rookie. Make that twenty minutes half an hour, yo."

He was going to have to style his hair instead of just brushing it. Or, shit, maybe lose the ponytail.

[intraspective]

"That's high praise, comin' from you," she said, honestly delighted. "We can do half an hour."

[raspberryturk]

"Good, yo," Reno replied, looking a little relieved. And still a whole lot impressed. "Bathroom's that way?"

He mostly just picked a direction and pointed. He wasn't wrong, but it wasn't as though he actually knew.

[intraspective]

"You got it," she said, suppressing a giggle. "On the left. My room's across from it, feel free to use that too."

[raspberryturk]

"We'll see what I end up needin'," Reno replied, smirking as he managed to slip back into his giving-no-shits casual demeanor. He set off toward the bathroom to get himself ready, pausing one more time to wolf-whistle at Ino from the bathroom doorway.

What? He had himself a hot date for tonight and he hadn't slept in days. He was allowed to be a nib.

[intraspective]

Ino's laughter rang out.

Hey, she wasn't going to mind a whistle when she'd worked damn hard for it.

While he was busy cleaning himself out, Ino wandered out to the living room, to take a careful seat on the couch there.

[raspberryturk]

And Reno was going to end up taking every minute of that half an hour. He had to clean up his suit, too, after all. There was blood and there were burn marks, and then he had to figure out where the hell he'd put that necktie he never wore, and it was a whole goddamn ordeal...

When he came out of the bathroom, though, he was not only cleaner. He'd lost the goggles, covered up the tattoos, put in hazel contacts to hide away the extra blue in his eyes, and had run enough hair color through his hair that he was leaning away from shock-red and into dark auburn territory.

"Hey, you got an extra pair of hands I can borrow?"

[intraspective]

"I do indeed," she said cheerfully, getting up from where she'd been reviewing some of her notes from her lab. "What do you need help with?"

[raspberryturk]

"The hair," Reno replied, gesturing vaguely behind himself. "I can tuck it away or cut it off, but there ain't nothin' I can do with it on my own that's gonna be half as fancy as it's gotta be, I'm thinkin'."

[intraspective]

Ino tsked.

"Don' you dare cut it," she said sternly. "Get back in that bathroom and let me see what I can do."

[raspberryturk]

Reno held up his hands in surrender, and then went rummaging through his pockets for some cuff links as he turned to duck back into the bathroom.

"You're the boss right now, whatever you say."

Hey, if she had it covered, she had it covered. Most of it, he could just slick back or something. But that ponytail? That reached past his ass these days. That one was going to take some work.

[intraspective]

"You haven't done anything to your hair yet, have you? For styling? Nice colour, though." She tugged gently on his hair as she thought about what to do with it. "No gel or anything?"

[raspberryturk]

"Figured I'd get your input before putting more gunk in there than I gotta," Reno replied with a shrug. "Top bit's gonna need a little negotiating anyway, I'm sure."

This was what happened when you had crazy people hair.

[intraspective]

"That's because whoever cuts your hair usually needs to be taken out back and shot," Ino said sternly. Between his terrible posture and her heels, she was actually tall enough to get a good view of the back of his head today.

There was something to be said for heels. And for not having to stand on a stool.

"Okay, hang on, I know what I'm doing," she said, as she reached for a comb, a few pins, and a hair elastic. She'd need hairspray, but she'd use that in a bit. "Stay still."

[raspberryturk]

Huh. Pins. Reno could count on one hand the encounters he'd had with hairpins, and none of them had involved his own hair.

"Staying still," he replied, anyway. "Lemme know if you need me to pass you something. My hair is in you hands, yo."

He was trusting you, Ino.

[intraspective]

With his hair, she was absolutely trustworthy.

Besides, this was a nice interlude before he murdered her later.

Ino was kinda looking forward to his reaction, honestly. She was The Worst.

"I'm good with hair," she said, instead, as she started working. "And you'll clean up just fine."

[raspberryturk]

"I'll have you know," Reno drawled, "that I already know I clean up good. I just don't choose to do it often."

It had been a good frigging decade and some years now since he'd been anywhere he might have to.

[intraspective]

"Hush," she said absently, most of her attention on this hair. "Don't argue with a beautiful woman when she's complimenting you."

Honestly, Reno.

[raspberryturk]

"I think I was halfway agreeing," Reno pointed out, "but whatever you say, yo."

He could behave himself on occasion. He was too tired to stir up too much shit, anyway.

[intraspective]

She was sleep-deprived too.

It made for an interesting combination.

Ino just hummed, and kept on working. It went fast, all things considered, especially once she wrestled all the hair on the top of his head into position. That was where the pins came in, tucked under the top layer, where they'd hold but not be seen, and then hairspray applied to hold everything in place just in case.

The braid down his back was easy as pie in comparison. She tied it off with a clear elastic and surveyed her work.

"Much better than cutting your hair," she said, satisfied.

[raspberryturk]

Reno tilted his head, looking at himself in the mirror, somewhat bemused.

"Shit," he laughed, "where'd I go?"

He hadn't seen himself in a disguise like this in forever. It was almost unsettling.

"How long we got before we gotta take off, anyway?"

[intraspective]

"You look like you're fit for a date with me," she said cheerfully. He looked damn hot with his hair like that.

"Ten minutes," Ino said, stepping back from him. "Enough time to not rush back to the Causeway."

[raspberryturk]

"Well, good," Reno said, straightening out his tie, and then straightening up his posture, rolling one shoulder and then the other, his usual drawl slipping into something a little more refined.

A little more, 'clearly Reno is immitating Tseng's speech patterns,' mostly. But he was damn good at it.

"Ten minutes? Plenty of time to take a pretty lady on a nice stroll to catch a portal, I'd say. We have quite the evening ahead of us, I trust."

[intraspective]

"Oh, geeze," Ino said, looking up at him. "First--you're even taller, which, unfair. And secondly, I'm gonna have to start talkin' like that too."

Dammit.

Like Reno, she could do it. But ugh.

[raspberryturk]

Reno blinked, and then Reno laughed.

"I have faith that you can do it," he replied. Yes, he was going to stay in this persona until they had safely disposed of the materia. Better for making sure it didn't slip. "Just talk like Rosalind to go with all of this Tseng I'm doing now. Nobody will ever guess."