Chapter Two

Part 1

The redhead had always hated dry places, it meant that there would be a lot of dust-filled gusts that kicked up, it meant to him that there would be a lot of coughing later once he got back to headquarters. Traveling to Kalm hadn't been the issue. Small towns meant relatively light foot work for him, and the food was almost always all homemade.

The problem besides the dust-filled gusts, was that it was damn near impossible to ask around for information without giving anything away that you didn't want to tell the locals.

It was about midday, the sun had been burning his head for the last hour prior to him arriving into the small town. The damned admins had failed to supply his buggy with spare parts to fix it should any issues come up. Shady people as always, must have been a perk he had inherited with the position of an Inquirer. He needed to get to Midgar to locate a very important file, or else his handler would have a behemoth's tit. Gaia, he hated her nagging.

He could never fail to keep his eyes open behind the dark tinted glasses that sat on his narrow face. The redhead's body was slender beneath the suit he wore, his jacket had been tied around his waist while his sleeves had been rolled up to the elbows. His short red hair had been cropped short even though it was obvious that he had wild hair that could never be kept manageable. He walked with obvious cockiness that even a few women who looked his way raised their brows in interest. Slung over his shoulder was what appeared to be a scythe of some measure, although it had such a light look to it that a few people thought it was a mere farming tool.

Heh, if they only knew that I had to slaughter my way to get here.

The redhead smirked at the sheer memory of the battles he had to endure to get free, from beasts to nasty bandits, he had cut them down fairly quickly. Up ahead was what appeared to be a gate of some sort, manned by two men who had a ragtag sort of uniform on. They were both armed with auto rifles though, and had them readied, aiming at the young redhead as he approached slowly.

"State your business!" one of the men called out to him.

The young red haired male simply grinned and kept walking towards them, silent as he adjusted the weapon slightly, his hand shifting so that instead he was holding the weapon by his wrist.

"State your business! Or we will fire!" Called out the guard again as the sound of safety's being switched off was caught by the trained ears of the redhead.

That sound made him pause long enough to observe that both men had obviously been trained by someone who was familiar with the weight of a firearm, as their arms didn't even sway in the slightest from holding up their rifles.

"I'm an Inquirer from the WRO. I need a place to rest and some salvage to fix my buggy that has broken down about an hour out of the town's limits." His voice was smooth, like a bourbon drink with just enough ice to give it a cooling effect before the burn of the alcohol

The one guard who had spoke turned to the other, mumbling something that caused the other to take off past the gate, disappearing into the town's inner limits.

"Approach slowly, and drop your weapon." The guard ordered, his gaze trained in on the red head.

Obliging, the Inquirer dropped his scythe before walking towards the guard slowly. Getting closer to the guard, he noticed that it couldn't have been a man more than a few years older than himself. The guard must have noticed this as well, lowering his weapon slowly in complete belief that this young man could not be held as a hostile threat to him, he did the most dangerous he could have done.

He had underestimated an Inquirer.

The redhead snapped, his foot shot out and snuck behind the guard's forward leg, pulling the man's leg out and offsetting the weight. His arms moved quickly, grabbing the rifle from the guard and turning the butt of the weapon up into the man's chin before slamming it into the man's jaw. Once he was sure that the man had been caught off guard his other leg carried him, shifting around the guard in a hip twist as he threw the man to the ground. Pulling the guard's side arm from his hip he had clicked off the safety and had the barrel pressed to the back of the man's head in a second. The checking the simple watch on the guard's wrist he smirked.

The whole blitz attack had been in only three seconds.

He leaned in to whisper into the man's ear a very menacing message.

"Never believe an Inquirer is never a threat." CHA-CHINK

The redhead froze as he felt himself being trained in on.

"An never think ya'self tha you sum badass, ya punk. Now back off of Gary 'fore I put another fistful a holes in your sorry pale ass!" Came in a gruff voice behind him.

The red head moved his arms slowly away, holding them up as he stood up slowly, turning to face a rather large, ebony man, with a gun arm pointed right at his head.

"Barret Wallace. Leader of Avalanche. Herald of the Planet. And just the man I was looking for." he grinned.

"Wha the fuck you want?!" the man spat at the ground as the red-haired man took off his glasses.

"You may not remember me, I was just a young infant when you last saw me. The names Jacob. I'm Jessie's son."

Part 2

Marlene awoke on the floor of her bar, The Eight Wonder, with a slight pressure behind her eyes. A sign she knew very well that signified what would happen if she didn't handle herself carefully. She went over what she could remember from last night. The Chocobo races had been on in her bar, so it was packed. Martin had went home. Then there was…..

Snooooorrrrreeeeeeeee

Him. By the sound of his snoring, Denzel was out cold. Looking around her, Marlene looked for a glass of water, she would need that if she planned on getting off this damned floor. Just how many shot's had they had last night? Feeling a slight chill she glanced down at her chest and felt a rush of blood fill her cheeks.

She was only in her undergarments!

Cosmos, for her to be that close to nude, she had to have at least ten shots last night. Sitting up, she felt the sudden assault of a hammer pounding on her skull with the brutality of her old teacher's lessons. Ok, maybe more like at least fifteen. Struggling to her feet, Marlene clutched the counter to hold her steady as she glanced around her bar.

It was a complete mess, the counter itself was full of shot glasses, at least half her stock of clean ones. the tables and booths had still had the mess from last night piled on them. Denzel, of course, was passed out just beside a booth, with only his pants still on, by the grace of Cosmos for that. Marlene spotted her clothes strewn in random places, her boots were by the door, her socks were on one of the ceiling fans. She found her skirt on the counter that allowed people to see into the kitchen and she managed to spot her shirt on the back stairs that lead up to her apartment above the bar.

She found a glass of water and began to drink it slowly, uncaring of who had last used it as she felt the pounding of her skull lessen to a manageable throb. Then setting out to gather up her clothing, careful to not wake up Denzel, at least caring as far as her clothing was concerned, she didn't need her brother seeing her like this, family or no. No man had seen her like this before. A point she was very proud of as she knew a few of her old classmates already had families of their own. Marlene wasn't ready to settle down, either by restlessness or lack of a good man, it didn't matter what people said. She was proud of who she was.

After gathering her clothing, she calmly slipped upstairs to run a cold shower. She always loved cold showers, they felt like the rain. Splashing cold water on her face, Marlene felt herself fully wake up. The grumbling in her stomach telling her that she needed to eat, even if her stomach didn't agree with her. Peeling off her black panties, she slowly climbed into the shiver inducing water. Taking delight in the feeling of the cool water rushing along her skin as she washed away the sweat of yesterday.

Going to Midgar huh? Sounds like a good break from this mundane.

She let the thought flicker along her mind before settling into a meditation with a smile.