paixaorpg | Just like home? [complete]

Entry tags:

Just like home? [complete]

Character(s): Reno and Rufus
Content: Information and discussing recent events
Setting: Their rooms in the Actua Are at J7
Time: Early afternoon
Warnings: None so far.

So. The city had a monster infestation. That wasn't exactly new of course - between Hojo and the monsters that lurked outside Midgar he'd gotten pretty damned used to monsters. But this Sin thing? Didn't sound good at all. And the fact that it was being 'run' by an undead madman wasn't any better. One madman was one too many as far as he was concerned.

Not that life had ever really taken in interest in what he wanted. But then again, it wasn't really like he cared. He was a Turk - doing dangerous things and things you didn't expect to kind of came the job. Even in strange worlds. And this development? Was all kinds of not good. Which meant it was time to once again step up and do his job; not that he'd been doing anything but lately. Ah whatever, he could complain about being overworked - again - later. Like after he'd finished being the bearer of bad news. And keeping Rufus from thinking he'd gone nuts. Well, no time like the present after all. Thinking wouldn't get him anywhere, after all.

So putting his journal down with a sigh he climbed to his feet and headed over to the door that separated his room from Rufus'. He even knocked, although he didn't wait for an answer before moving into the next room. He never had, truth be told.

"We've got a problem."

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Rufus being cut off from the rest of his Turks and resources was enough to be constituted as a problem. So far, it seemed as if the situation was appropriately circumvented, but Rufus and full vulnerability did not go well hand in hand.

Which just means that Rufus had to rebuild his base of power again. Somehow.

And if he can't be back on Gaia to make his amends, well. There was still Cloud here in this city. He'd just have to do until then.

Reno's arrival cut short his musing. The entrance itself wasn't surprising to Rufus, the Turk bursting into his office more more casually than his own Head of Turks would have done, though Rufus attributed that mostly to the man's impeccable professionalism. Reno was welcomed. His words were not.

Being welcomed was good, not that Reno expected any different from Rufus. Not when the two of them were all alone in a strange new world with a somewhat different set of rules.

"Someone in the city's woken up a monster. An' it ain't friendly or likely to leave any time soon."

The part about it being a madman at the helm could wait for a bit.

Being that they were both from Gaia, the term 'monster' covered a relatively good portion of the world. Specifics would probably be appreciated, though Rufus expected Reno to get to that in his own time.

From the sound of it, Reno was trying to ease him in.

"Oh?"

Hey, it was the best way to sound less like he'd gone insane, as far as he could figure. But there was a nod at Rufus' question nonetheless.

"Yeah," he answered, flopping down on the edge of the bed. "A big one, big enough to take out buildings. The guy said it was called 'Sin' - something from his world." A brief pause. "Oh, an' the thing spawns smaller monsters apparently."

In short, it was a damned big threat.

An eyebrow lifted, more at Reno's lack of a below-plate accent than at his worlds. Rufus was always able to gauge the strength of the threat from that telltale sign, most prominent when Reno felt the threat was of a 'Sephirothic' rating.

"And where is 'Sin' now? The man you were speaking to didn't reveal how it can be defeated?"

Rufus ignored the possibility of smaller monsters for now. In his own experience, if you took out the leader, you took out the rest by default. In theory.

"He didn't say where it was. Managed to get how to kill it out of him though." A pause and he shook his head. "It ain't sounding good, boss. It ain't impossible, but..."

He'd seen and done a lot of strange things but he wasn't at all sure about this one. Going willing inside a city-killer wasn't high on his list of things to do even if it was the only way to save the city and keep the people he needed to safe.

"I'm almost expecting the next words out of your mouth to be about Sister Ray or WEAPONS. Tell me that's wrong, Reno." Because, for obvious reasons, they did *not* have one of those available.

But from the look of uncertainty on Reno's face, it looked like the news might be worse. No matter. Rufus would plan accordingly.

"Nah, no Sister Ray or WEAPONS." It might be handy if they had either, but they didn't. And both of them would only destroy more of the city even if it did get rid of the thing.

"Turns out Sin's just the armor." Living, breathing armor. "Apparently you kill it by killing the guy inside. Who's apparently some kinda undead. There's a way to get him too, but... we'd be relying on one guy to finish the job - apparently he's the only one that can do it."

Edited 2008-06-02 22:54 (UTC)

Well. This sounded vaguely familiar. Rufus shook his head lightly, blond hair flipping back over his eyes. He didn't doubt that there would be a requirement of supporting cast in taking Sin down, though with Reno being his sole Turk present, he wasn't going to easily volunteer the man.

"And did this man specify who the person should be?"

Truth be told, Reno wasn't exactly looking to help out either, although he would if Rufus asked him to. Part of the job after all.

"A friend of his. Braska, he said the guy's name was. But... he didn't know where he was. Apparently he was supposed to get in touch and didn't."

Which, well, it wasn't totally out of the ordinary for people to not use the journals, he supposed but the monsters made things different. And different wasn't necessarily good.

Edited 2008-06-02 23:05 (UTC)

Rufus might not.

"That doesn't do us much good, now does it?" Indeed, it puts much of a cramp on things. And without more information, Rufus can't determine whether a substitute would suffice.

"And no one else can take out this monster? What are the other minor ones doing?"

"Not so much, no," Reno answered with a sigh, just barely resisting the urge to fall over backwards onto the bed.

"Probably the same thing as the big one, but on a lesser scale. An' it ain't about killing the monster. He said that it'd just come back if we killed it. We've got to take down the man on the inside."

"I can keep an eye out f'r this Braska guy though."

Even if it did make more work for him in the end.

Rufus got up from his chair, his coat falling back into place around him as he approached the bed Reno was sitting on. Stopping directly in front of the man, Rufus' hand moved towards Reno's chin to grip it sternly, warm fingers tilting his head up and studying the Turk's face with sharp eyes for any signs of fatigue.

There was a brief blink from Reno at that - it wasn't very often that Rufus actually decided he wanted to do something like this. Not that Reno was going to be exactly complaining, but there was a faint hint of confusion in his eyes.

Confusion, and yes, a bit more than a slight bit of fatigue, although he's been doing his level best to keep Rufus from noticing. After all, no need to worry the boss, right? But at this angle, well... it's going to be all but impossible to hide especially from someone who knows him as well as Rufus does.

Rufus ignored the confusion evident in Reno's expression, rare in that it hardly ever appears on Reno's jaded face, and continued to pick up signs that his Turk had been run ragged. He knew Reno well, knew all of his Turks almost too well, and the fact that Reno was trying to hide it at all instead of whining and complaining told Rufus how exhausted Reno was.

That was dangerous, running his men and women into the ground, and a mistake he'd learn not to make unless absolutely necessary.

And this situation did not need their help. Yet.

Rufus released the other's chin, eyes narrowed as that same hand slipped back to tug at Reno's pony tail. "You're officially off duty. We'll deal with this later."

If it weren't for the fact that he'd found himself effectively forced into acting as all four of the Turks, he wouldn't have bothered to hide the fact and would've been complaining quite happily. But as it was, this place had forced his hand, as it were.

But the fact that he'd been given a break was more than welcome. It was about damned time if you asked him; too many nights had been spent staying up and even he couldn't do that forever.

"Got it, yo," he answered, even as he moved to swat Rufus' hand away from his ponytail.

Rufus' eyes narrowed further at Reno's move to brush him off, yanking hard in warning on Reno's hair; not hard enough to warrant a loss of hair, strands or no, but at least enough to get his warning across.

Rufus was not pleased with Reno's move.

"No."

Hard or not, Reno couldn't help but wince all the same - it was more a reflex reaction to having his hair pulled than any indication that it was particularly painful. High pain tolerances came with the job, after all.

But he wasn't going to let Rufus pull him around by his hair either, as he moved to pull his hair out of Rufus' grasp. And if some hairs were pulled out in the process, well that was perhaps an acceptable loss.

It was his hair after all, not Rufus'.

And that's where Reno was wrong. Reno was a Turk and came with all that entailed, including belonging wholly to Rufus. While it was never demonstrated by Rufus himself, his father had made copious use of that fact, eliminating the Turks as he saw fit.

Rufus wasn't that careless with his treasures.

But at the same time, his controlling nature wouldn't allow Reno to show rebellion, not of this nature. There were things he wouldn't mind putting up with Reno for, if to keep the man content, but he would brook no leeway here.

His other hand came into play, fingers of both hands combing through the sides of Reno's hair, hands holding Reno's head immobile. While he was recently recovering from illness, he still had strength enough for this. "Reno," he voiced lowly, warning and reproach in the tone. If Reno fell still, Rufus would smirk down at the other, fingers moving to undo Reno's hair tie.

As luck would have it, Reno did indeed fall still at the feel of those hands holding his head in place. True, he probably could have gotten free if he really wanted to, but it wasn't particularly likely to be a good decision. Admittedly, he had a tendency to push the boundaries however and whenever possible, but he knew that he was, in the end, Rufus' Turk. Which meant that some things were not precisely on the list of things to do.

This was one of them.

But all the same he couldn't help but sigh at the all-too-familiar feeling of Rufus' fingers undoing his hair tie. He had a sneaking suspicion that he knew where this was going to be going.

Edited 2008-06-04 01:09 (UTC)

It wasn't quite done enough to be considered ritual, and yet had been done enough to not be considered a rarity. While Rufus had considered it as a harmless past time in the beginning, it quickly became an enjoyable task that allowed him to keep his mind off the black cancer that had slowly eaten and drained through his body.

Now, it was just a reminder of who held the strings.

Brushing his fingers and rubbing his thumb through the hair, Rufus continued to watch Reno. It was a test of his patience, forcing him to sit there and glance up at Rufus as he prepared the hair into three sections, though inevitably, Reno would have had to do it anyway if he was to sleep.

Deft fingers slowly braided the long, red hair, Rufus watching all the while for any twitching or discontent from the wiry man.

Perhaps there would have been slight signs of discontentment, had Reno not been quite so worn out. As it stood, however, there was little more than a general sense of grudging acceptance and perhaps a bit of impatience, although he wasn't actually attempting to move anywhere.

True, he recognized the gesture for what it was, but that hardly insured that he was going to sit tamely for it. He... just wasn't going to be moving. Or at least not yet anyway.

Braiding the hair didn't usually take as long regardless of the length and thickness of it, but Rufus was taking his time, leisurely flipping one grouping over the other. Nearing the end, he retrieved the hair tie, securing the end of the braid and letting it drop back behind the seated man.

He got the answer he wanted.

"Dismissed." Turning back towards the desk positioned at the far corner of the room by the window, he sat down, forefinger nudging the lid of the notebook up. Reno was free to sleep whereever he decided, but for Rufus, he had business to attend to.

There was a nod at Rufus' words, as Reno picked himself up off the bed. If he was going to sleep it might as well be in his own room after all - he knew the layout a bit better.

Not to mention it was comfortably messy, unlike the meticulously kept neatness of Rufus' room. Admittedly he could and often did sleep in unusual places but he far preferred sleeping in a place he knew. And so, braid swinging behind him as he went, he made his way back across to his room, closing the door behind him as went.

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Just like home? [complete]

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