Shinra Inc. And KupoCon
By: Jason Tandro
Foreword: This fiction piece was written for KupoCon: The Big Pom, a Final Fantasy fan event held in Newark, NJ on January 29th. I served as one of the judges for the fanfiction contest that was held by the KupoCon Staff. This piece, along with all of the entries in both the fanart and fanfiction categories were published in a handful of hardback books called the Record Keeper which were on display at this event. As this will be my 100th published story on Fanfiction, and since more than 60 of those stories I have published belong to the Shinra Inc. And series, I can think of no better piece to represent the body of my work so far. To those of you who got to attend KupoCon with me, it was a privilege meeting all of you. To my good friend RedFFWolf who alongside Alex helped put together the event and who chose me to serve as a judge and got me a free ticket to the event, to say nothing of how good he has been to me with some recent family troubles, I must offer my sincerest gratitude.
I also need to show some love to some friends who I met at the Con, first and foremost my fellow author Mr. Ite. Mr. Ite had the first book of his JENOVA Project (The Mercenary) available as a gift to Ultima ticket holders. A signed copy of this masterful retelling of the first part of Final Fantasy VII will hold an honored place on my bookshelf for the rest of my life. I also met an author I have previously had discussion with back when I ran a fanfiction podcast (brief though it was) - Tennyo. She also does some amazing work. To my friends from the TLS Forums, LithiumKatana17, Carlie, ForceStealer and AvecAloes let me assure you the pleasure was all mine.
Anyways, enough of this sappy foreword, let's get on to the story. Everything below is the story as it was presented in the Record Keeper.
==Shinra Inc. And KupoCon==
Author's Note: Looking at the prompt choices, I really wanted to have the cast of my Shinra Inc. And series visit KupoCon. But I also felt it would be a good opportunity to mercilessly mock myself. I hope you enjoy this piece, and the spirit of good humor in which it was intended!
At the best of times, a 6 hour car trip with Rufus Shinra behind the wheel would have been taxing. The choice of vehicle for the excursion did not help matters at all. The Shinra brand all terrain buggy had the hallmarks of disuse about it - including rust, scattered trash and - most suspect of all - a completely unopened granola bar sitting expectantly in the glove box. Furthermore it lacked any sort of music hookup except an AM/FM Radio and the only local stations of this wasteland environment were a grainy patchwork of country music and firebrand preachers doom-mongering from their magic book of choice.
"Why again can't we simply take a chopper up to Gold Saucer?" Reeve asked.
"Because we have to set the tone," Rufus replied lazily.
"What was that?" Scarlet asked, leaning in from the middle row.
"Er, because the choppers are all in repair," Rufus corrected.
"This is going to get meta pretty quickly isn't it?" Reno whispered conspiratorially to Rude who simply shrugged.
"Hey, take a look at the MyFace page for the event," Elena said, trying to ignore him.
She had stumbled upon something of note - an announcement that all the Slowga tickets (that is to say 'last minute' or 'door' tickets) were sold out.
"That's okay, no door tickets. But Rufus has all our tickets for us," Reeve said. "Enough for him, you three Turks, Scarlet, and myself."
"We all know who's here. Why are you announcing something we already know?" Reno asked.
Rude just handed Reno his flask. "Drink up, it's only going to get worse."
"Incidentally, why didn't Tseng come with us?" Scarlet asked.
Elena shrugged noncommittally, unwilling to admit that her bae was presently at home watching a My Little Coeurl marathon.
"Did this dude just use modern slang in a description sentence?" Reno said between hearty gulps.
"My Little Coeurl isn't even funny," Rude grunted.
"You guys aren't supposed to be seeing that," Reeve reminded the two.
"Look we agreed to do this thing mainly for an opportunity to showcase ourselves, and what is this loser doing? The cheap and easy route. What's gonna happen? Gee, I wonder. Is there gonna be a problem getting into the event and hijinks will ensue which we have to overcome, just like in every episode of this series he writes?" Reno asked.
"Well sometimes the resolutions are clever," Elena offered.
"No they're not, they're just well-written. Like the author assumes that a decent vocabulary is an excuse for anemic story structure," Reno said before blinking and adding. "See 'anemic'. I guarantee you he used a thesaurus to find that word. 'Weak' or 'shoddy' would have worked just fine there."
"We're getting off track people. Can we try to actually tell a story?" Reeve asked.
"I'm just getting warmed up," Reno hissed, before taking to flask to his lips again.
Reeve used the opportunity to return to the regularly scheduled fiction. "So, I say, Rufus has enough tickets for the lot of us, right?"
"Well, no actually I-"
"Let me guess," Reno asked. "You did something selfish and foolish because your character is a one-trick pony."
Rufus ignored him and continued, somewhat louder. "Well, no actually Reeve, I bought myself one and assumed you all would buy your own."
Reeve waited a beat, as if waiting for a laugh, before proceeding, though there was a certain stiffness in his words. "But Rufus, you said that this was going to be a company event and the company would pay for our tickets."
"How will we get into the event now, after coming all this way?" Elena asked, playing her part dutifully.
Reno groaned. "And now I bet we're going to cut to a different scene because he can't write scene transition worth di-"
~* Shinra Inc. And *~
The group stood outside the entrance to the Gold Saucer as Rufus began to rattle off a carefully (read: hastily) constructed lie. They all stood anxiously awaiting the results of this farce, except for Reno who for reasons unknown had chosen to stand guard by the buggy at attention in the hot desert sun for ten hours instead of participating in this super fun event.
"So you see that's why one ticket should be good for five people," Rufus finished.
"So what you are saying is that you bought eight tickets, but only brought one," the attendant said, unimpressed.
"That's correct."
"Even though each ticket is individually numbered with your name and ticket type," the attendant added, with a delicate stress that snuck right up to the line of overtly rude without crossing it.
"That's correct."
"And you chose not to bring the other tickets because your printer ran out of ink?"
"That's correct."
"When you run the largest corporation in the world which basically controls the entire planet."
"Have you priced ink cartridges lately? I tell you they're worth their weight in gold. I'm not made of money, you know," Rufus retorted casually.
"Is that a solid gold cell phone case?" The attendant asked.
"That was never mentioned before this joke and will never be mentioned again," asked Rude with such inspiring solidarity to his banished partner that one wonders if he wants to spend the next ten hours in the sun beside him. He takes a sip from the flask and adds sheepishly. "I'll be good."
"Look enough of this. I own the world. There is literally no reason for me to ever have a problem ever with anything without it being specifically manufactured. I'm 'easy-buttoning' this. Let my pals in or I'll have you arrested," Rufus ordered.
The attendant shrugs and moves aside to let them all pass. "Have a wonderful day."
~* Shinra Inc. And * ~
And so the group found themselves within the thick of the fan event. Hordes of event-goers stroll by wearing elaborately crafted costumes which took countless hours and dollars to forge - all worth it for the beautiful display they create. Eager to join the fun, they head towards the changing rooms to get into their costumes. Rufus is the first one out, wearing a black suit and tie, a cheaply made Shinra ID badge and sunglasses.
"What… are you supposed to be?" Reeve asked, as he stepped out wearing a massive Mindflayer costume.
"I'm a 'generic Turk'," Rufus explained.
"So you just threw on something you usually wear, added some cheap accents to it and called it a costume?" Reeve asked.
"Yes," Rufus nodded. "That's impressive by the way."
"300 hours and twice as much gil," Reeve said.
"Hey now, your costume is clearly the better one, but some of us aren't loaded with cash and have to go for cheaper options. You shouldn't shame me just because I went with a more economical option," Rufus said.
"First, are you going to turn this into a morals shtick, because we're floundering as it is," Reeve groaned. "Secondly, solid gold cell phone case."
See, I did bring it up again Rude.
Elena is next to leave wearing a full sized moogle costume which for some inexplicable reason shows midriff, and Scarlet is wearing an abundantly revealing character costume.
"I'm gonna get stared at for this, aren't I?" Scarlet sighed. She glances suspiciously at Rufus.
To his credit, Rufus just shrugs. "Hey, I may be a totalitarian dictator who uses an over-bloated military to effectively imprison the entire population of the world, kill anybody who disagrees with me and slowly destroy the planet using life-sucking reactors. But I am not a pervert."
Scarlet smiles approvingly. Reeve grudgingly gives a thumbs up. "Okay, that's a good point, but don't make this a thing."
"Scene transition?" Rufus asked.
"Scene transition." Reeve affirmed.
~* Scene Transition *~
The cosplay was, strangely enough, won by Rude, who had donned a full-sized full functioning Proudclad costume. However he would later be disqualified when the officials found out that he had actually just brought a Proudclad with him to Gold Saucer. This violated the "No Weapons" policy and he was summarily kicked out of the event and sent to go wait by the buggy with Reno. The prize was later given to the runner-up: some anonymous "train man" who was wearing a full working model of Midgar. He even had real chunks of the Sector 7's plate lodged in his head.
The event shifted to a dance, with a live band playing some classic tunes from the franchise. Scarlet found dancing in stiletto heels to be at best a challenge, but not as much challenge as Elena was having trying not to knock anybody over with her bulky costume. Reeve had chosen to avoid this pitfall and not dance at all.
"What's the matter, I thought you were light on your feet," Rufus asked.
"I am. I'm not light in a 30-pound costume with a gigantic head," Reeve replied.
"You gotta do the sway thing," Rufus said, moving his hips back and forth rhythmically without moving the rest of his body, save his hands which seemed to be desperately trying to milk an invisible cow.
"You look ridiculous," Reeve groaned.
"But I'm having fun," Rufus laughed. "And now if you will excuse me I think I have to go do what these youngsters are calling 'dabbing'."
~* Nobody Wants To See That *~
Next up was a card tournament based upon the popular Triple Triad. Each person with a ticket (and indeed a few people without tickets, but with access to a world-spanning military regime) was given a small hand to play with. Elena seemed to be the best player in their group casually winning hand after hand with expert strategy. Scarlet attempted cheap distracting strategies but this was ruled poor sportsmanship and she was forced to wait out the remainder of the tournament. Reeve didn't bother entering the card tourney either, but did spend a great deal of time trading with others while admiring the fantastic artwork.
"Somebody clearly spent an enormous amount of time on these things," Reeve smiled. "They look amazing. Look at this, it's pristine."
"The art is very pretty," Scarlet agreed. "I mean if I were writing a story about this event I would definitely be sure to include a few paragraphs just to comment how amazing they look, regardless how unnaturally it flows with the rest of the story."
Reeve ignored this and continued to boast. "I swear each card just keeps getting better and better! Whoever did this should be very proud!"
~* Suck-Up Transition *~
All good things must come to an end, and so the event began to wind down. It would have been a seamless and tasteful exit, except for the later events included alcohol. Reno and Rude had somehow managed to sneak into the event, perhaps drawn in by the scent of a predictable joke, and were knocking back shots like soda.
"You see, we need to comment on that alcohol events," Reno slurred. "So he makes the Turks do it because we're always drunk."
"Why does he make us drink," Rude groaned. "Cause those two whole scenes where we were in bars. I mean we got a hard job of course we gotta drink now and again."
"One trick-pony," Reno added. "That's all he knows how to do. I bet he's not even building up to a joke or anything."
~* No, I'm Not *~
Rufus smiled widely as they returned to the buggy. "You know, I've learned something from this fan event."
"That the author is a narcissistic loser who has to make everything about himself?" Reno asked.
"Err, no," Rufus faltered.
"That basic rules of decent human conduct needing to be reinforced in a comedy fiction is both unfunny and preachy," Scarlet asked.
"Not that either," Rufus replied.
"That a community event between people who love something is a wonderful idea and that while we may come from various backgrounds, cultures, races, religions and so forth being able to join together as one out of love for something we love is a beautiful testament to the healing power of the arts?" Elena asked.
"No. I've learned that if you don't leave your car parked in a safe place, somebody will probably steal it," Rufus said, pointing expectantly to the nothing where once stood their ride home.
"Oh," Reeve groaned, rubbing his head.
"Probably should have stayed with the buggy instead of making a dumb joke," Rude shrugged.
"Don't worry. I'm sure he'll end the story without a proper resolution," Reno quipped.
The End