Cat Among the Pigeons
A/N: Once again, another fic courtesy of the Viva La Reefie forums and Don'tCallMeBones, who regales us all with funny things heard in Spanish class. I'm thinking about making this a series of little fics. Read Fowl first. And again, on the name of the Cheese guy, the order of the Spanish adjective and noun is intentional. It's kind of part of the overall joke.
If you have any suggestions for funny language mishaps the Turks have, let me know in a review and I'll see what I can do (Turk involved, language, phrase, some combination thereof, etc.)
Now for the standard disclaimer: I do not own FFVII. Square Enix does. I'm just borrowing their characters.
Elena was taking her time walking back. It was her lunch break, she had just had a fabulous lunch at Rachel's, and the sun was shining. Best of all, she was in Edge on business at Reeve's behest. And that meant peace and quiet. Everyone loved Reeve, so when Rufus was called in for a meeting with the WRO Commissioner, no one batted an eye. Rufus was left alone, the Turks were left alone, and it was the most relaxing mission ever.
The only thing they had going was a press conference in two days. That wouldn't be a problem, though, because it was Reeve's press conference, regardless of Rufus being one Turk short. Rude was still recovering from that incident in Costa with Reno. He'd hit Rude pretty hard, in the face with his mag rod. Elena still wasn't sure what the whole thing had been about, but she did know that it was the reason she and Reno were learning Costan. That annoyed her. Rude and Tseng got out of it because they already spoke other languages, and Elena acknowledged that it was wise to be multilingual, but she didn't think it was fair to have to learn because Reno screwed up.
Elena took a deep breath and sighed. She resolved to put her annoyance out of her mind. This was kind of like a vacation, and she intended to enjoy it. As part of 'enjoying it,' she decided to take a detour through the park. It was largely deserted, being after the lunch hour for most of Edge's citizens, but there was a group of little children playing on the benches. They looked Costan, and they were talking. Elena decided she might as well practice, but before she got close enough to talk to them, they suddenly shouted something that made her blood run cold.
"Presidente Shinra, saco dos pistolas y te disparo con un gato!"
Elena didn't know much Costan, but, as a Turk, she had made certain to learn words related to her profession first. Therefore, she was able to recognize the words for President Shinra, and also pistols and shoot. She didn't know what else the children had said, but hearing Rufus' name in the same sentence as guns and shooting was enough to make her go after the kids.
"Hey!" she shouted, running at them. "Hey! What did you just say!"
The kids froze, looked at her, and oddly enough, broke out into huge grins. Then they scattered. They took off running in so many directions that Elena couldn't follow them all. She chose to chase the cockiest one, a scruffy little ragamuffin with a taller build than the rest of the group. She nearly had him before he jumped a fence and ducked into an abandoned building, but not before he looked back at her, smiled, and said "Presidente Shinra, saco dos pistolas y te disparo con un gato!"
Elena gave up. She knew she couldn't catch the kid in the warehouse district by herself. Instead, she pulled out her PHS, dialed Tseng, and told him what she had heard.
By the time Elena made it back to the WRO, everything was in an uproar. Security had been increased, and it took her five minutes to get in the front doors, up the elevator, and into Reeve's office, when it usually only took her two.
Once in the door, she stood sharply at attention until Tseng or Rufus noticed her. Incidentally, it was Tseng who saw her first.
"Elena! Good. Come over here and tell me exactly what it was you heard," Tseng said, beckoning her over to Reeve's desk. Rufus was in a chair in front of it, looking shaken. He had never been threatened on a visit to Reeve before, in any fashion whatsoever.
"Sirs. I can only tell you what I understood," Elena said, standing next to Rufus.
"What do you mean?" Rufus asked, looking up at her.
"I don't know that much Costan, sir. But I did make sure, when you ordered Reno and myself to learn, to familiarize myself with words relating to guns and other terrorist activities. I clearly heard the words Presidente Shinra, pistolas, and disparo; President Shinra, pistols, and shoot, respectively, sir. There were more words, but I was unable to understand them. They sounded like gibberish, sir. I'm sorry."
"No, Elena, you have given us something to go on. Who said these words? You mentioned children?" Tseng asked, looking her straight in the eyes.
"Kids? More kids? Ragged kids? Were they cocky? Did they laugh at ya?" Reno broke in from his post holding up the wall.
Tseng was about to reprimand him when Elena surprised them all by nodding. "Yes, Reno, they were. Ragged and cocky. And they laughed at me. I chased one of them, but he jumped a fence and disappeared into the warehouse district. Before he entered one of the warehouses, he stopped, smiled at me, and repeated the phrase they had said earlier. That's when I called you, sir" she said, directing her attention to Tseng. "I knew I couldn't follow him in there."
"I knew it! It's gotta be those damn kids again, bossman! The ones Rude and I ran into in Costa. I bet they followed us here to taunt me again!" Reno said, looking both frustrated and eager at the same time. He still hadn't forgiven the Costan group for making him look like an idiot, and for getting him in trouble.
Tseng cut him off before he could go any further. "Reno, enough! You're being paranoid. These children did not come all the way from Costa to find and torment you. Elena, you did well, breaking off your pursuit. These children are most likely associated with a larger terrorist organization. You may have been in grave danger had you followed the boy alone."
"What should we do?" Reeve's quiet voice entered the conversation.
Rufus looked up and met Reeve's eyes. "I refuse to be cowed. This is ridiculous. I will not be frightened by a threat perpetrated by children, regardless of the potential. I will not cancel the press conference, Tseng, so don't even suggest it. Just increase security. Reeve?"
The Commissioner shook his head. "Not a problem."
"Good. Elena, Reno, since you both know Costan to some degree, I want you tracking down those children and whoever they are affiliated with. Rude is in Wutai, but I'll have him brought here as soon as possible. If he leaves Wutai tonight he'll make it here by the conference. That should be sufficient."
"Rufus, some of my people speak Costan," Reeve offered.
Rufus shook his head. "No, Reeve, they don't know what these children look like. Elena does, and I want a group of two. She and Reno can handle this. And Reno," he said, shooting a smirk in the redhead's direction, "if it is the same children, make sure you don't injure Elena."
Reno shot Rufus a glare that would have frightened a lesser man.
The next forty-eight hours were a living hell for Elena. She and Reno spent every hour together, barely getting any sleep, combing Edge and the warehouse district, looking for the children. They never saw them again, but they heard them. Feet would sound above them or behind them, accompanied by snatches of giggling and bits of the phrase Elena had heard in the park. They had only heard it in its' entirety once, when they were walking between two tall, abandoned buildings, "Presidente Shinra, saco dos pistolas y te disparo con un gato!" rang out, scaring both Turks half to death.
"I know that voice, yo! It's those same kids," Reno said, holding his EMR out and visually scanning the building on his left.
"You heard those kids nearly a month ago, Reno. I think Tseng's right, you are being paranoid," Elena snapped back, her gun cocked and pointed at the building on her right.
"You would agree with him, 'Laney."
"What's that supposed to mean, Reno?" Elena, tired, cold, and dirty, turned on him.
"It means, 'Laney, that you always agree with Tseng. Now come on, let's go. If they're still here, we'll never find 'em."
The morning of the press conference, they got lucky. They were quietly trudging along a side alley in Edge proper, too annoyed and miserable to talk, when they heard bits of garbled Costan. Elena and Reno looked at each other with grins that could only be described as crazed. They crouched down and edged their way forwards, until they could see the source of the language, a group of ragged children bent over a cardboard box.
"That's them!" Elena whispered.
"Yeah, yo, and that's the same group I ran into in Costa! I was right, yo!" Reno whispered back, shooting her a triumphant look.
"All right, fine, you win. What are they looking at?"
"I dunno, I can't see."
"Oh, Mister Redheaded Turk," the voice came at them in a singsong chant. Reno and Elena froze.
"I know you are there, Mister Redheaded Turk, with your little Yellow-headed friend. We have a surprise for you. Presidente Shinra, saco dos pistolas y te disparo con un gato!" the voice crowed out the last part, and Reno and Elena looked up from their hiding spot just in time to see the children scatter once again, taking the box with them.
"Damn it!" Reno cursed. "Come on, 'Laney, we gotta get back to the WRO and tell Tseng these kids mean business this time."
"Right. The conference starts in," Elena checked her watch, "two hours! Do you think they had guns in that box, Reno?" she asked as the two started to run back to the WRO building.
"I don't know, but they did say pistols and shoot, I got that part. And we never did find that El Grande Queso guy, and he was supposed to be a gunrunner. They probably do have guns in that box. Did you catch what the end of that sentence is?"
"No. All I got was conung and ato," Elena said between breaths. "You?"
"Naw, I heard the same thing. We'll check the dictionary when we get back."
Reno and Elena tore into the building, fighting to get past security while on the phone with Tseng at the same time. Yuffie, pulled out of the field by Reeve, yelled at security until they let the two Turks past without any problems. In the time Elena and Reno were out looking for the kids, Reeve had mobilized all available WRO troops, and the building looked like it was ready to go to war. That many personnel hadn't been present since the DeepGround crisis.
Tseng met them at the top of the elevator. "Rude's on his way in. He'll get here in the next two hours. Did you get any more of the phrase?"
"Two hours, sir? That's right when the conference starts," Elena said, wishing Rude would arrive sooner so she could pick his brain. "No sir, we got what we think are two words, but we're not sure."
"Yeah, bossman, where's the dictionary? We got conung and ato. Don't know what they mean, though," Reno said, twirling his mag rod around, obviously on edge.
"Here," Reeve said, handing Elena the dictionary. Reno bent over her shoulder as she paged to the 'c' section.
"Con, ah, no conung."
"Yeah, and nothing that would fit, either," Reno said. "Here, let me see about ato." He took the dictionary and flipped back. "Nope, no ato, either."
"Are you positive that is what you heard?" Tseng asked them sternly.
Both Turks nodded. "Yeah, bossman," Reno said. "As close as we can make out. Costan's tough, ya know, especially when they talk so fast. I only got the damn te tiro un pato thing 'cause they chanted it so many times. I told you it was the same group of kids!"
Tseng sighed, closed his eyes, and tilted his head back. "Yes, yes, Reno, we know. Now, I need ideas as to the meaning of those two words!"
Yuffie, having just come up on the elevator and caught the tail end of the conversation, said, "What about code words? Maybe they don't mean anything. Maybe they're people's names."
"That's brilliant, yo! That's it! Conung and Ato are people's names, that's why they're not in the dictionary!" Reno said, eyes wide.
"They must be the people who are doing the shooting, sir!" Elena said, her voice taking on a tinge of anticipation.
"Very well. Now, I want the two of you near Rufus at all times. You know what these children look like, and they will likely be present. An hour and a half, Turks, an hour and a half," Tseng said. "And write down what you heard, so Rude can see it when he gets in."
By the time Rude's helicopter landed, the conference was just about to begin. Security was tight and Elena and Reno flanked Rufus, alert, but not openly displaying their weapons. They didn't want to cause a panic in the crowd. Tseng was walking behind Rufus with Reeve close by his side.
Rude picked up the paper Reno had left for him, listing the phrase they had heard and that it 'was those damn kids again.' "Conung ato, conung ato," he murmured to himself. "Wait. Oh, no." Rude dropped the paper and made for the elevator.
Elena and Reno looked around, trying to spot the Costan children. They saw no one familiar, and as Rufus had insisted on speaking, they stepped slightly off to either side to give him the necessary space. Tseng had only relented when Rufus agreed to wear a bulletproof vest.
Suddenly, a voice raised itself above the din of the crowd and announced, "Presidente Shinra, saco dos pistolas y te disparo con un gato!" and an unholy yowling rent the air. Elena and Reno, assuming the worst, that the sound was whatever weapon the children had managed to get ahold of, dived in front of Rufus.
Now if one had captured the moment on film and then slowed down the tape upon playback, one would see two skinny, scruffy felines, completely stretched out, spinning through the air, meowing at the top of their tiny lungs, paws waving madly in an attempt to find some kind of purchase. After approximately two-point-three seconds of flight, one would see these felines find their purchase. Namely, the heads of Reno and Elena.
Rude burst out the doors of the WRO building calling out "I take out two pistols and shoot you with a cat!" just in time to see his two colleagues straighten up and stumble around madly, crying cats attached to their heads, Rufus pinching the bridge of his nose, Tseng looking skyward, and Yuffie, Reeve, and the rest of all those assembled laughing their heads off.