Disclaimer: Characters are the property of Square Enix. Song lyrics are the property of the artist and publisher named. Written for fun and not for profit. Bleh.

Inspired by Mako Headrush's excellent portrayal of this pairing and her encouragement (nagging) that I undertake the same.

Come on and lay it down
I've always been with you
Here and now
Give all that's within you
Be my savior
And I'll be your downfall—Matchbox 20, Downfall

The one thing that Rude remembered, dimly, over the few beer soaked brain cells still capable of holding a conversation with each other, was that Vincent Valentine was an evil fucking genius.

The warning had come years ago. Years before it became relevant, years before he would be holding a flashlight for Vincent over his partner's mailbox. He recalled Reno making the statement in passing as they discussed the conundrum of the former Turk.

"I dunno, all Cloud says, and they're thick as thieves, is that Vincent will put you up to shit and the next thing you know, you're running around behind him doing it like it's your idea and you have no clue why you're out like a maniac on some cockbrained shit, but you are and he looks at you like you're nuts. Like, why are you doing this? And you're too retarded to go yo, it was your idea!"

Rude wished he'd listened. The lock pick made a snicking sound; Vincent held up a standard government envelope and grinned. A full on grin that Rude, that no one on the planet had ever seen and that Rude would have lost any amount of gil saying it did not exist. His heart and stomach and places farther south did a funny flip flop thing.

"Mission accomplished. But what are we doing out here, Rude? This is insane."

Two weeks earlier…

"So did you two have fun at the Art Fair?" Tifa handed out drinks to the usual post work crowd, finally getting down to the end of the bar and her friends.

"Yeah. Reno got me this." Cloud showed off what they had privately started calling their engagement bracelet.

"Oh, that's pretty! Special occasion?" Her voice held a teasing note.

"Not really. He just didn't know my ring size." Wait for it. Wait…for…it…

The screech, when it happened, could have shattered every glass in the bar. Vincent paused in the act of walking in the door to press his hand to his forehead. He shared a sympathetic glance with Rude and headed for the seat next to him, the only one vacant at the busy after-work hour.

"What, pray tell, was that?"

"Judging from the decibel level, I think our boys just got engaged. Or, she saw a dead body."

"I think she's seen enough dead bodies that she'd just lie about not being able to lift it and make us do all the work. Gods, that was unpleasant."

They looked down the bar and Tifa was apparently trying to smother Cloud with her breasts. "So, did you set a date? Are you registered anywhere?"

"Tifa. Off. Down in front, I can't breathe. No, we haven't planned anything whatsoever, dudes don't do that. We barely pick our socks."

"Hmph. Some of us pick our socks just fine. Didn't you date her, for about ten minutes?" Vincent looked over his wine glass.

"I was interested in a couple aspects of her personality. It didn't last long." Women never interested Rude for long. Men, on the other hand…damn, Vincent looked good out of that cloak. The sight never lost its impact. He was slender, but still muscular, not thin. Tall, almost leggy. And in spite of inheriting his mother's fine-boned Wutai features, he still managed to escape looking effeminate. He was, to quote Tifa, sex on a stick. And Rude really, really wished he could stop noticing. Are you all moved back in?"

"Almost. Gods, even when you hire it out, it's an endless process. I'm tempted to set fire to the boxes and buy all new." He reached over Rude's shoulder for his wine glass and the slide of muscle under silk was heart-stopping.

"That place just around the corner from Reno and Cloud's right? Fifth Place? Nice complex." Rude had never been there because, despite having purchased it years ago, Vincent had never furnished it past a bed and basic toiletries; just enough to keep him from having to rent a hotel room when in town. Now that he was moving to Edge, however, things had changed.

"It's amazing what assets accumulate when you leave them alone for thirty years."

Rude choked on his beer. He had almost forgotten Vincent's twisted humor.

He liked it.

Tifa walked up and kissed Rude on the cheek. "So, they aren't going to do anything, apparently. I just feel like we should throw them a party. Do something, you know?"

"We will, babe. Not sure what, but we'll know what to do when we see it."

She refilled their drinks and walked off to wait on more customers. "You two seem to get along pretty well for exes."

"We do. We parted friends. I don't know what I was thinking anyway. I apparently wasn't. I don't normally date women." He had no clue why he needed to tell Vincent that. Did he?

"My track record on the other hand is positively stellar." Zing! Vincent bent down to get something out of his work bag. Had those pants always fit that tight? Time to steer his mind away from that dangerous territory, perhaps just go home. But the gunman's finger was in the air, summoning Tifa for another drink for himself and one for Rude as well.

It would just be polite to stay.

Three rounds later, he had Vincent's new phone number and no clue what he was going to do with it. Vincent Valentine had a phone, again, and he had the number. Score.

Tseng's summons came as a surprise.

"Do you know anything about a wedding?"

"Reno? As far as I know he isn't having one. They are just…ambiguously engaged."

"He has filed a change of family status for the insurance. It requires at least an application with the courthouse. I received a copy of the initial paperwork today. I was just curious as to whether we should do something, but if there are no plans, I'll let it be."

So, there was official paperwork filed. The opportunity to "do something," as Tifa had put it, was presenting itself. An idea took hold in his mind. He took out his phone, the image of Vincent's slender build and biting humor overcoming the sirens in his mind that warned him away. His finger hovered over the dial button for a moment. What the hell, you only live once.

The eyes nearly matched the color of the wine in the glass.

"The application is filed electronically but the license is mailed. The old fashioned way. Yes, welcome to the world of low technology. It then has to be finalized by a notary public in front of two witnesses."

"And?"

"We can steal it from his mail box. Isn't Elena a notary?"

"But that's mail fraud!"

Vincent ran one gold claw through the silk of his hair, unbound and falling past his shoulders. They had met at a small outdoor bar, away from Seventh Heaven, the bustling crowd providing more privacy than total solitude. He appeared to briefly pray for patience.

"Rude, you are a Turk. Remember? You routinely practice everything from torture to murder to extortion to kidnapping on a daily basis, unless things have changed since my tenure with that organization. And you're balking at mail fraud?" He sighed. "When did you say this was applied?"

"Tuesday."

"Good, the mail service is terrible, always has been. We'll start tonight. You contact your ex girlfriend." He said it like he had just tasted inferior brie. "I'll call Tseng."

"Okay." Wait, what? Rude blamed his distraction on the jeans Vincent was wearing, which had replaced the just-as-tight leather pants from before. The dark silk shirt was loose around his shoulders but no less sexy and Rude thought he could catch on the wind the faint scent of an exotic oil, or something. It suited the man. It smelled…forbidden.

That night, after they finished drinking at Seventh Heaven to keep up appearances for Reno and Cloud, they dressed in all black and broke into the mailbox. It was the first of two weeks of nightly dates between them.

Several days in, they established a routine. They would go to Vincent's condo and change because it was closer to Cloud and Reno's loft. Rude would stand entranced, hoping his sunglasses—and a long baggy shirt—hid most of his sins, as Vincent braided back his hair and covered his gauntlet with a long black leather glove. He bragged about how Cloud had turned him onto a custom leather shop that made the thing and how much he loved it. Rude could not have cared less if Vincent had bought it off the rack at the drug store, but the smell of leather in the small dressing room and Vincent clad in tight tactical pants and a slim turtleneck was making him warm. And insane. A good insane. Between a full work day, his drinking at the bar, his second career as a mail thief, and his new hobby of creating twisted sweaty sheets at night, he was working on less than four hours of sleep. The early hour of tomorrow's meeting with Tseng loomed at him; already his eyelids and stomach burned with the next morning's anticipated drowsiness.

"Ready to go?" Vincent handed him a flashlight and sheathed a set of lock picks in his back pocket, the motion pulling his sweater tight against his chest. Eyes glowing with mischief looked at him over a full sensual mouth.

He'd never felt better.

Vincent pulled the envelope out with the care of a brain surgeon removing a bullet. They slipped down the street like the thieves they were and hid in Rude's car, parked in a nearby alley.

"We did it, Rude. We fucking did it." The word "fuck" coming from Valentine's patrician mouth sounded impossibly naughty, made Rude feel naughty too, even though he usually conjugated the word on an hourly basis himself.

Nights were just turning chilly in Edge and he could almost see Vincent's breath over his blinding white grin. He felt giddy. "What do we do?"

"Take it to Tifa. We'll decide on a time and tell Cloud they have to come to the bar to get sign it. Elena can notarize it. We are geniuses, I swear."

"Wait, this was your idea, I'm just here to carry the flashlight!" Rude couldn't help it, he was laughing. Cloud had been right, all those years ago. Vincent just…kidnapped you, somehow. They stopped, looked at each other.

"Cloud told Reno once you made people do insane things."

"Did he now? I shall have to talk to the boy about that. Ruining my reputation is unacceptable."

The kiss, when it came, shocked Rude down to his soul. He remembered thinking that Vincent's mouth was the softest thing he had ever felt. It seemed to go on for hours, the world outside the car ceasing to exist. Rude's hand came up to tangle in the scented length of Vincent's hair, unbraiding it as he went, and began to harden the kiss into something…more. Something hungrier. When he broke away, they were both panting for air.

"Put up that damn license where we won't lose it. Two weeks of foreplay is enough, damn it all," Rude muttered as he started the car.

"You too? Gods. Don't wreck."

Inside, the rush of lust had dissipated and a kind of hesitant awkwardness took its place. Vincent paused at locking the door.

But Rude gently turned him, cupped his chin and not-quite kissed him, pausing against his lips. "Do you want this?"

They had been friends. They had been enemies. They had danced along the edge of this. Rude wanted this, but he had to know for sure; he would not risk losing this man as a friend. Almost imperceptibly, he felt a nod. Whispered into the shell of his ear, "Sure?"

Vincent shivered, and held tighter to him. "Yes." Rude felt lender fingers, still cool from the late fall night air, stroke his face for a split second before removing his glasses and placing them on the table beside the door.

Nothing to hide behind. Not anymore. They stopped and just, for a little while, held each other, kissing sometimes, but mostly just holding. This was them, who they had always been. Rude pulled up Vincent's sweater and slipped his hand underneath it, stroking scarred flesh, fascinated by the difference in texture at the same time he hated the reasons for it. He buried his other hand in the lengths of midnight hair, tilting his head for another deep, sinful kiss. He noticed an odd wiggling against the door and looked down; Vincent was toeing off his boots.

"Impatient, aren't we?"

"It's been long enough." The reality hit him. This was Vin. His Vin.

And he was right.

They stumbled down the hallway, laughing, stripping off the rest of their clothing and landing sideways across the bed. Vincent stopped to stare at him.

"What?"

"Unlike you, I couldn't pretend to not be ogling behind sunglasses."

Rude had the sense not to answer that; he was guilty as charged. He couldn't think of much to say, though. They had gone back to kissing, mouths making up for years of words not said. Then, he raised his head for a good, shameless ogle of his own. Vincent lay stretched nude on the bed, half beneath him, the contrast of dark hair and pale skin made even more dramatic in the moonlight. Rude trailed his fingers down his lover's body, drawing a gasp. His perfect face sported full lips now bruised by Rude's attentions. He leaned down to kiss again, gentler now, gathering up the long soft hair in handfuls like he'd wanted to do forever. Vincent ground up into him; Rude wrapped his arms around him to bring them closer. "Mmm…did you happen to unpack…"

By then, Vincent's tongue was otherwise occupied, working its way down Rude's abdominal muscles, but his eyes glanced up to the bedside table. Rude managed to get the bottle out of the drawer and then nearly dropped it when Vincent's mouth closed around him.

He stopped breathing. He wasn't sure what it felt like to be struck by lightning, but he was getting pretty close to the sensation, he was sure. And he was even more sure he'd never been touched like this in his life, with this combination of care, gentleness, passion. "S…stop. Need…stop." Well, he'd never been much of a wordsmith but Valentine was turning him flat-out Neanderthal.

He wasn't going to complain, though. Vincent, riding him, touching him, head thrown back in passion, was so lovely that he could not watch it. It hurt too much to breathe. He felt hand's on his chest, hair tickling his face. Looked up to see his lover losing the battle against his own control. Mouth open, eyes closed, in a silent moan.

"Oh baby, so beautiful." He knew Vincent would never believe it of himself but it was true. "Love you." He reached down to stroke him then, barely registered the warmth spilling over his hand before he was lost in his own surrender.

Gods. Just so beautiful. And his, now. His. He caught his breath around the lump in his throat. Vincent whispered, "Will you stay?"

"Yeah." He wondered if he would ever be able to speak more than a single syllable again. His brain felt like mush.

They got up, finally, to clean up and get a drink. Needing something a little more refreshing than wine, Rude whipped up some of his mother's sangria. Vincent padded into the kitchen in a ratty pair of pajama pants and a soft, worn t shirt.

He looked gorgeous. Rude put an arm around his waist and kissed him, just under his earlobe. It earned him a quiet little moan.

"We'll deal with all the wedding crap later."

It was a whole sentence. Rude felt like cheering. Instead, he just pulled Vincent to him and leaned into the counter until they walked, still tangled in each others' arms, back to bed.

Xxxx

Seventh Heaven had never seen such a party.

Vincent had called Cloud; even Rude hadn't been able to keep a straight face as he informed his friend that his marriage license had in fact been stolen and if he wanted to marry Reno he would have to do it in public. And so Reno and Cloud had entered the bar with all of their friends cheering them on. The usual welcome mat had been replaced with some obscenity sporting wedding bells and doves. Tifa had covered every square inch of space with banners and balloons and everything she could find at the local party goods store.

The grooms signed the license with huge feathered pens and did shots afterward. Elena was on hand to notarize the signatures. Cid gave them a penis shaped bottle of tequila for a wedding present, but no one was reading anything into that.

"I'll pay you to write that thank you note for me, Vin."

"No."

"How, in the name of Gaia, did you pull this off?"

"We broke into your mailbox."

"That's mail fraud!"

"That's what Rude said."

"You convinced Rude to go along with this? Gods, you never change. Your evil genius knows no bounds. But thank you. I didn't know how to ask for this, neither of us did, but it's exactly what we wanted." Reno was drunk enough to start eyeing the present from Cid. Cloud moved to intervene.

Vincent looked over the crowd. "No, I think my evil genius is exactly what it needs to be." He made his way to Rude's side and whispered something that made the bald man laugh deeply. They waved at the happy newlyweds and slipped unnoticed out the back door of the bar.