raspberryturk | Reno's Room, 29 Chimera Court, Thursday Evening

Call it whatever you wanted, Reno was in a state tonight. Repeated attempts to appeal to Tseng's better judgment hadn't quite gotten him the 'yeah, come back here and we'll actually fix that' results he had been hoping for. While he enjoyed the island as much as anybody possibly could, what he was actually accomplishing here, besides babysitting a Rookie who was really only in any real danger back in Midgar - and wouldn't be in that danger unless a certain silver-haired mama's boy reared his head - wasn't nearly enough. The Gaia that Ino, that Iris, called home now had become a godsdamned wildcard, and for all that they'd sorted out the AVALANCHE mess that had ruined the Turks in his own timeline, with Zack and Cloud out of the game, they'd unleashed a whole new sort of beast on the Planet.

There were a lot of things Reno could do. Sneak back to Gaia, try to put Rude up to doing something stupid, send Tseng a few more completely inappropriate care packages from Dite's, just accept his lot in life... but these past few weeks, with a direct order from Baby Boss to keep his chocobo-tattooed ass on the island and babysitting the Rookie, the most productive thing he could manage was just thinking.

A lot.

Into a bottle.

Fuck this shit. The world had ended once on his watch, if it was going to happen again, he intended to at least be drunk for it.

[OOC: Cut for your typical end of the world reminiscing and a Turk exercising an old drinking habit. For one!]

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Ino rolled her eyes but couldn’t help huffing a laugh at the same time.

“Tseng’s orders,” she agreed. “But Zack ain’t the same risk he were back when those were first given and I bet if we hacked Portalocity, we could slap down a no travel order on ‘im. That’d be ‘bout the same thing.”

She hesitated.

“And, it’s important, what we’d be doin’. More important than teachin’ here or playing at runnin’ a shop.”

"Way more important," Reno agreed, after a long pause. "This you just spitballin', or sayin' it should be done?"

Well, Ino was just going to let that silence sit there a little bit.

There was a lot of think about and how Zack was going to feel about it was no small consideration. She didn’t just want to up and leave on him, but she weren’t sure bringing him were a good idea neither.

“Both,” she said, finally. “I ain’t sayin’ we ought to pack up and go right now. I think we ought to try and figure out plans and a path to start lookin’ down beforehand. But I weren’t just sayin’ shit to say it. I think we ought to go, once all is decided. Though… if we find him, I ain’t sayin’ we ought to try and take him out either.”

Reno listened to all of that, and then huffed slightly. It was almost a laugh, if you squinted.

"All that effort to find him just to get our asses killed for nothin'? Yeah, pass."

Ino smiled slightly.

“Not my idea of a fun time either,” she agreed. “But… finding him, yeah, I’m down for that.”

Reno was quiet again.

"So," he said, eventually, "that sounds like the start of some kinda game plan."

Which was good. It was more than they'd had before.

“Yeah,” she said, “we do."

Ino considered the ceiling, and the ferret, and Reno.

“It ain’t savin’ the ones you lost, but it’s somethin’ that ought to help the ones that ain’t lost. That help?”

Reno sat up just enough so that he could look down at her.

...

"Yeah. Yeah, that helps."

Her puppy was gonna hate it, though.

She grinned up at him in the darkness. Zack weren’t going to be the only one who hated this.

“Then we’re on.”

It felt good, to go completely off track.

"We're on," Reno agreed. And he grinned faintly. And then he laughed. "Forget Sephrioth, yo. How the hell is that reality gonna survive us, anyway?"

She started to giggle.

“They’re goin’ to love it,” she insisted. “Love it. Eventually!”

They were probably not going to love it. And Ino knew good and well that it was ideas like this that were the reason why she and Reno weren't paired up on jobs often by Tseng.

"Poor bastards don't even know what we're doin' for 'em, yo."

It was better that way, granted.

"Now, gimme that bottle of water over there, would you?"

"I ain't getting up," she grumbled half-heartedly, even though she tilted her head enough to see where--ah. Yeah, that looked like a water bottle.

Her hair snaked out and grabbed it, then dangled it above Reno's head.

"Happy now?"

Reno gave her a crooked little smile, reaching a hand up toward the bottle.

"Happier'n I was, yo. Needed this, apparently."

She let him have the bottle, smiling slightly.

"What, the water?" Ino teased gently.

"Definitely the water, yo," Reno replied easily. "You ain't no cure for a hangover, Rookie."

"I weren't trying to cure your hangover," she scoffed.

"Nah," Reno agreed, unscrewing the cap and taking a deep swig from the bottle. "Guess you weren't."

She'd done a hell of a number on the cause of it, though.

She was annoying as shit that way.

"You're welcome," Ino said easily. "I got tired of what you were doin'."

"This one of them 'next time just talk about it' things?"

In hindsight, sure, that made sense.

"I mean, I ain't the quickest one to do that either."

No shit, Ino.

"But maybe after a few days of drowning, consider alternatives?"

Look, if you needed a guy disappeared, you called a Turk. If you needed to blow a building up good, or cover up a massive slaughter that destroyed the entire population of a small town? Call a Turk.

If you wanted healthy coping mechanisms, call a shrink.

"Yeah, sure, I'll keep that in mind," Reno decided. "... Worked out, anyway."

Ino wouldn't argue that.

"Only 'cause I got your back," she said cheerfully. "Where do you want to start with this?"

"Recon," Reno replied. "Where the hell else?"

He paused, and then added, "President's gonna die first. I'd suggest we get extra security on him, but that'd just be a waste of resources anyway."

If you wanted cold calculation, you called a Turk.

Nobody would be able to stop Sephiroth from killing the President. And frankly, Gaia was better off without the old man who had thrown the Turks under the bus in the first place. Not that Reno was nursing a grudge, honest.

"Rufus'll like that," she said, smiling slightly.

Shut up, Ino liked Rufus.

"And I weren't talkin' 'bout on Gaia. I were talkin' before. We got to hack Portalocity. We got to wrap shit up here--'less you want to just pull a runner, but Tseng might notice less quickly if we synced with the new semester comin' up."

She had to figure out what the fuck to say to Zack.

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