"C'mon, Rill, don't leave me hanging!" She sighed, looking up at Zack to get a full blast of his pleading expression.
"If you put your foot in your mouth with your companions and are short a date because of your own idiocy, it has nothing to do with me." How did this guy make it into SOLIDER? She thought despairingly.
"Pleeeeease?!"
"Zack stop bothering my secretary." Sephiroth said sternly as he entered the room. "I believe she already said no."
The spiky haired young man groaned, collapsing before her desk on bent knees.
"Please, Rill? I'm never going to live it down if I don't have someone! I'm out of options!"
"Call in sick, break a leg, find someone else. You have other options." Rill regarded him with piercing eyes over her glasses. "Really Zack. The last thing any woman wants to hear as that they were a last resort. If you have been playing the desperation card with any other woman, it's no wonder you haven't gotten any results." he opened his mouth...then closed it and actually looked pensive.
"Ya think so?" Rill resisted the urge to facepalm. Sephiroth oddly enough had no such compunctions. Though he naturally did so much more elegantly than most anyone else could have managed. Rill suspected Sephiroth could make faceplanting look polished but had never seen it for herself.
"Really Zack? Even I know that. I really thought Angeal would have taught you better."
"Angeal can't do anything right with girls! What could he teach me about them? How to act like a boring stick?" Rill thought back to what she had heard, then hid a smirk.
Zack only thought that. Angeal had a much larger array of tamer, more reasonable admirers than either of his more...flamboyant counterparts. Simply, it was because he was a well-mannered country boy at heart and to the city girls, there was very little more attractive than that.
She hummed a soft tune as she ignored Zack's continued pleas. If he couldn't figure it out, she wasn't about to help him.
Four months had passed since Rill had begun to work for Shinra. She still popped down below the plate regularly to touch base with Aeris. She was fairly good about not being seen. It had taken the Turks a month to realize she was even going down to the slums. They were watching her closely, but she heard a mischievous little giggle from the Planet say that Tseng wasn't going to spill the beans.
"Aeris, are you aware that the Wutian Turk has a crush on you?" She asked rather bluntly after watching the place where he was hiding for a bit.
The girl hid her face with her hands, blushing fiercely.
"She told me too...Please don't say that where he can hear..."
"He respects your privacy enough not to bug the church or the house." She assured her cousin easily. She let a broad grin spread across her face. "He's actually a pretty decent guy." Aeris responded by throwing a handful of dirt at her cousin as they tended the flowers together.
This resulted in a small scale battle with the two girls throwing soil at each other until Rill's phone cried out with the erratic, playful sound of barking puppies. She could think of little else more fitting for Zack.
As he was Angeal Hewley's personal student, and since his mentor was out of the country, on assignment to Wutai, he ended up reporting directly to Sephiroth, for both his triumphs and his more colorful mishaps. Thus, he had encountered Nerilka fairly often. She still wasn't quite sure how he ended up with her number...
It was either the incident with the holographic tonberry wandering around on Halloween, or the paperclips...Maybe the chicobo smuggling ring. She hastily wiped off her hands and answered the phone. The voice that came through...wasn't what she expected.
"Come on, come on, come on...! Pick up, pick up, pick up ...!" She blinked. It sounded like Zack had inhaled helium and was being fast forwarded...
"Is there a reason you sound like a four year old on a sugar high?"
"Rill! You are a lifesaver! I need help! I'm in the Sector 4 sewer!" She heard a yelp over the line. "You know, the one the Science Department dumps their live experiments in! Crap-!" He was speaking so rapidly she almost had to take extra time to process what she was hearing. Almost.
The Plant whispered something to her, sounding like she was trying not to laugh. Aeris had both her hands over her mouth as she endeavored to do the same. Rill quietly put the phone on speaker, doing her utmost to maintain her professional facade.
"Something managed to hit you with the Mini status, and you have no Cornucopia to change back. You cast Haste on yourself earlier and you are currently attempting to not get devoured." Rill said with amusement in her tone.
"It's not funny!" Zack's voice cracked and squeaked through the tiny speaker, audible to both listeners. Aeris clamped her hands over her mouth all the tighter. He sounded like a deranged chipmunk. "Soon as the Haste spell wears off, I'm done for! I'm barely staying ahead of this thing. AND I CAN'T KILL IT LIKE THIS!" His voice reached ear piercing qualities and Rill held the phone further away from her ear, reaching up to try and soothe the ringing she was now experiencing. Questions as to why Zack had called her instead of Sephiroth or anyone else in the SOLDIER department would have to wait. There were creatures more than large enough in the sewers that could swallow him whole as he was.
"Hold off for five minutes. Try to lead them towards Sector 5." She said dryly, turning her head towards the Turk stake out nest they had constructed once Aeris made it clear she was regularly coming to the church. She didn't know who was on duty at the moment, but they would be able to get Zack the help he needed. If not, their phones would.
"I'll try." Zack squeaked as something loud crashed on his end of the line and he cursed impressively, making Aeris jump slightly. "They found me!" Then a ripping sound. "Damn it those were my favorite pair! Get back here and fight you dirty-" The line cut out.
Rill got another image. Zack hiding under an old newspaper and using the phone that hadn't shrunk with him and desperately trying every number in his registry to get some help.
Despite him being in very real danger, Rill couldn't help but chuckle as she strode over to the watch nest. Only Zack could fight a monster in the mini status, and in his underwear to boot.
Rousing the Turk pair took only a moment. But getting them to be useful was another matter. They were both drunk, completely plastered, having determined that Aeris wouldn't get herself into trouble. This would not do, at all. Her first reflex would have been to strangle them, but she contained herself...
She loomed over them, eyes flashing and the materia in her bangle glowing ominously. With dirt and grass stains on her hands and arms, and the former on her face, the only thing that stood out to the drunk pair was a pair of deep blue eyes almost glowing with fury.
"There is a SOLDIER who might very well lose his life in the next sector. l refuse to allow the slovenly habits of a pair of drunkards to get him killed!" She said tightly, her anger barely contained with clenched fists and stiff shoulders. The hapless duo, no matter how drunk they were, retained a certain amount of self preservation and attempted to run and hide from the raging female.
Rill caught them both by the ear before they made it ten steps, pulling them down painfully to hiss in their ears.
"Make no mistake! Veld and Tseng will both being hearing of this and see to it you are set to cleaning infantry latrines for the next ten years!" She channeled her energy into the Heal materia she had on her arm and purged their bodies of the alcohol and the resulting hangover, a necessary trick anyone with a Heal materia could make a living off of in some areas of the slums. Even as their heads cleared from their inebriation, she knocked their heads together with a brisk, brutal motion, setting them to ringing again. Just for good measure. They clearly don't have much of value in their heads in the first place.
With a none too gentle boot to the rear, Rill sent the bewildered pair off into the sewers, seething with fury.
She was rather fond of Zack and her own inability to rescue him galled her more than she anticipated. Not only that, but her quiet afternoon with her cousin was completely ruined!
Rill? Aeris concern at her anger calmed her somewhat.
I'm fine, Aeris. I need to head back topside sooner than I thought today. Some imbeciles need killing...
Rill. No. Some days, Rill wished the Lifestream had a censoring option. It doesn't need one. You know murder is illegal.
It's necessary! I promise! No one is going to miss them!
I said no.
Reno and his current trainee, Alvis, who also went by Rod, had located Zack, still tiny, but making an admirable attempt at killing a monster known simply as 'Hungry' who was responsible for his current state. It took them approximately 17 minutes to find and kill the monster with Zack's aid. It took ten minutes to get the appropriate medical attention to let them begin their journey back. They took another hour on top of everything to return to HQ.
It took Rill about twenty minutes to return to the Shinra building. She made her report to Sephiroth about Zack's situation. He had been in a meeting with his PHS switched off and was less that pleased about a monster capable of that level of magic being let anywhere near civilians. As per his orders, she then filed for an investigation as to why a monster capable of casting Mini was let loose in the city by the Science Department, no matter how weakened it was. She took care to remain as obliquely polite as possible. She may not have experienced what Aeris had at the hands of men like Hojo, but she was not inclined to like anyone that caused pain as carelessly as they did.
Rill also wrote a full report on the Turk's behavior, including the minute, incriminating details she had spotted in their lair. Veld and Tseng were both very interested in hearing what she had to say.
By the time the battered, exhausted trio returned to Shinra, Rill was back at her work, and the raging slum girl that had knocked two Turks on their rear was nowhere to be found. Dressed in a clean blouse, blazer and skirt with her glasses perched on the end of her nose, Rill was back to looking like the perfect secretary.
When Reno officially met her later to assist in planning the bi-annual clean out of the sewers, no one could understand why he cowered in terror from the polite, demure woman, insisting that she had an evil doppelganger haunting the slums.
"That's way more of a priority than any nasty in the sewers, yo!"
It took all she had not to choke with laughter on her tea.
After the meeting, Sephiroth spoke up."How did you manage to get Reno to fear you in the first place?" The secretary gave her boss a polite smile as she glanced up from her mundane clerical work.
"My best guess is I bear an unfortunate resemblance to whatever terrified him so. I cannot say more without confirmation and, as he has only recently stopped shaking whenever he is near me, that has been difficult to acquire." He hid a look that was bordering on a grin. Rill's sense of humor could be quite dry and he appreciated her sarcasm. It was one of the great pleasures in life to watch her deal with Heidegger. The blustering idiot couldn't seem to wrap his brain around the fact that he was being played each and every time they spoke.
"Sir, you deriving enjoyment from my interaction with those suffering from a severe deficiency of intelligence, while flattering to some extent, is rather disturbing in most other cases." Sephiroth couldn't help but burst out laughing.
"Goddess, I love the way you talk sometimes!" Her expression was reserved and slightly inquiring as she regarded him...
Her boss appeared to be unaware that he was spinning in his chair rather rapidly with a grin more akin to what Zack would usually be sporting on his face. She picked over and picked up the landline.
"Hello, operator? Reroute all calls for General Sephiroth to me for the next day or so." She listened to his automatically questions as to why. "He appears to be having an adverse reaction to his latest round of Mako injections and isn't fit to take calls at the moment."
Once he assimilated the new energy, Sephiroth gave his secretary a nice bonus as thanks for keeping him away from interacting with most everyone.
"Anytime sir." She placed a bottle of aspirin and a fresh cup of tea on his desk without looking at him. Mako crashes were worse than hangovers. He was already nursing his second cup. She looked down at him with a smile that held a touch more mischief than she usually let people in Shinra see she possessed.
"If I may sir, you're even more cuddly than Zack when you're in the final stages of a Mako high." The great general whipped around, a faint flush of bewildered surprise on his face.
"Say what?" Rill then activated an enviable skill that most women seemed to have mastered. Selective hearing. She didn't respond to any questions about just what Sephiroth had said or done in his former state.
Sephiroth was nervous.
An unusual event in and of itself, but he had good reason for that.
Zack and Reno had hit it off remarkably, terrifyingly, well on Reno's impromptu rescue mission of the young SOLDIER. Both were missing and had been for several hours, and Zack was due for Mako injections today...
Of all the days for Nerilka to decide to disappear. He bemoaned his ill fortune as he sat through a long, dull meeting with the board of directors and the president. Scarlet was eyeing him hungrily without even the decency to feign subtlety. Heidegger was yelling for more funds. Palmer was playing Tetris under the table on his PHS. Reeve was suffering as much as he was, clearly on the verge of falling asleep. He looked dead on his feet. The vice president was having some wandering thoughts as well. Veld was reflexively watching all exits and entries, Hojo was gazing off in his own twisted version of a daydream. The president was outright snoring! Supplier meetings are always as interesting as watching paint dry.
For all the apparent lack of interest from the department heads the man trying to make his sales pitch about a new kind of construction material wasn't looking that discouraged. What was it again...? A new kind of alloy from mithril and lead. Sephiroth didn't have the luxury of simply tuning out. His mind, unfortunately, seized and stored almost every piece of information he came across.
Sephiroth all but sang aloud when a break was announced. He went to a small niche away from where the other department heads discussed and disparaged the hopeful salesman and dialed Neilka's number as quickly as he could.
"Ah, hello sir. I was wondering when you would call- Zack, quit squirming! It's for your own good!" He relaxed.
"You found him then?"
"Find would imply I was looking for him." The secretary replied dryly. "In his mind, currently, he is not Zack Fair, SOLDIER 2nd Class. He is the the Spiked Fairy, stalwart defender of the Planet and savior of damsels."
"And you were the first damsel who came along..." Sephiroth passaged the bridge of his nose. He didn't understand how Rill could have such a refined sense of humor in most cases, yet still sound like she was laughing at most of the idiotic things Zack did.
"It was either myself or Scarlett." He flinched. With that kind of a choice, small wonder Zack had gone for Nerilka. For all she held herself like an Ice Queen, she didn't give off the same predatory aura that the head of Weapon's Development did.
"Where are you now and how soon can you strap him down?" He heard a slight scuffle and a metallic echo from overhead.
"Zackery Fair, stop squirming or there will be no dessert for you!" The extra noise stopped immediately.
"Dessert?"
"I promise him a home cooked meal if he behaves himself while on his high." And that explained everything. Honestly made, freely given, delicious food was not something one passed up on in the Shinra building. Not when the cafeteria had a habit of feeding it's employees...questionable substances.
Sephiroth heard another echoing clang from overhead and glanced up. Rat must have gotten in the air ducts again. He heard someone trying to speak on the other end of the line. Zack, probably.
"Ah, Zack, for one thing speaking through a gag doesn't work, and it's for our good not just yours. For another, it's not polite to invite someone over to a house that isn't yours." Nerilka chided him gently. "I must say, he does have a good point though. What do you say general? I'm already cooking for an army just to feed him, but there's room for one more." Nerilka's cooking...
There wasn't even a question about it.
"Nerilka Thomas, you are a saint." Sephiroth swore vehemently, already dreading the time when the meeting would resume and drag on for another three hours...
"If you could see me now, you wouldn't think so. Six o'clock sharp, sir. My apartment. I'll see you then." There came another rattle from beyond the ceiling tiles.
"This is ridiculous!" Scarlett snapped, glowering overhead. "I want maintenance to look through the air ducts! It's horribly disruptive to have loose equipment rattling around in there!" Sephiroth felt a sudden chill... He lowered his voice even further.
"To satisfy my curiousity...why is Zack gagged?" He did not want to have to explain this to Angeal...
"To keep him from disrupting the meeting, of course. Good luck sir, I'll see you tonight."
Getting through the meeting knowing that Nerilka and Zack were watching in the air ducts was suddenly much more challenging. But at least now he was entertained.
Sephiroth had grown accustomed to Nerilka… Rill to the point that he hardly gave more than a second thought to her being nearby. She just always was. It was simply one of the laws of his reality now. So when Angeal and Genesis returned from Wutai to find that he was having an in depth conversation with a strange woman about chocobo hatchlings, he was momentarily confused as to the absolutely dumbfounded expressions on their faces.
Previously, his interactions with women of his own volition could be counted on one hand.
Rill regarded the other two 1st Class with her usual polite composure.
"Commanders Rhapsodos and Hewley, so glad to see you have returned safely." She looked at Sephiroth with a raised brow in silent query. The silver haired man nodded, a genuine smile on his face.
"Go on, you've already finished everything for today anyway." This brought a faint ghost of a smile to her lips.
"Pending any additional paperwork due to Mako induced antics." Sephiroth tensed...then sighed. The other pair of SOLDIERs exchanged bewildered looks for a moment. Were they missing something...?
"How many have there been?"
"Only three. All the appropriate forms have been prepared, they only need your signature."
"You're a godsend." Genesis didn't even wait long enough for the door to close behind her before rounding on Sephiroth.
"Who are you and what have you done with our antisocial asshole friend!?" Sephiroth didn't so much as blink.
"Hello Genesis, lovely to see you too." Angeal rolled his eyes.
"Right, good to be back, Sephiroth."
"Who was that and why were you smiling?!" Genesis's eyes glittered with an idea that the general was quick to cut off, kill and bury.
"She's my secretary." He said blandly. This didn't seem to register has having been said, Genesis was already contemplating the potential of the situation.
"She's a little...less than what I thought you'd go for. I didn't think you were the secretarial type." he grimaced. "Just a bit too conservative for my taste. Really Sephiroth, I didn't think you would settle for someone so plain." Angeal watched the friend he hadn't seen in months closely. HIs composure remained almost flawless, as usual, but there was a slight tightness to his jaw the more Genesis spoke so casually of his secretary...
Ok, so apparently he made a friend while we were gone. He thought with approval. If it's a real attraction or just a friendship is irrelevant, either one would be fantastic for him.
As the topic was deftly maneuvered away from the peculiar young woman, Angeal also noticed that the tension left Sephiroth's shoulders. The Crimson Commander had clearly thought little of the girl, who looked as though she couldn't be out of her teens yet, despite Sephiroth adamantly affirming both her competence and their lack of anything but a professional relationship.
Angeal didn't see much of the young woman when he stopped by to see Sephiroth over the next few days.
"She said she was going to be taking a bow out as you and Genesis tend to be a package deal and she has guessed that he doesn't have that high of an opinion of her." The general explained dryly.
"Avoiding a confrontation is only going to confirm his opinion." Angeal pointed out, not quite seeing why Sephiroth was so adamant in her defense of the girl.
Girl? She was exceptionally mature and the most professional of all the women in the company. She handled a workload that would have strained three with ease and appeared to have become something between a mother and an older sister to Zack. His apprentice adored her. But whenever he looked at her, he couldn't think of her as anything except a remarkable child. It was baffling considering all other signs indicated she was a petite, but very much adult female.
"Sephiroth, how old is Miss Thomas?" The other man paused, eye unfocusing...
"I don't actually know." He said, sounding somewhat surprised at the realization. "It's never come up in conversation."
"Does anyone know?" Sephiroth shrugged.
"Whoever gave the ok to hire her ought to know. It can't be that ridiculous."
Rill felt a small shiver squirm down her back, goosebumps prickling her skin from head to toe.
Something rather important has just or will soon take place.
"Miss Thomas?" Tseng inquired, his usual calm giving way to a raised brow of query. She was delivering the list of cadets that had washed out of the SOLDIER program. Those who were applying for work elsewhere needed to have their papers altered accordingly, those who were leaving for other parts needed to be marked accordingly.
"Just a draft." With her delivery made, she bade Tseng a good day, slipping him a note inviting him to dinner the next time he was guarding Aeris, and made her way back to her office on the SOLDIER floor. Or she intended to do so. There was a very strong feeling that she needed to pass by the infantry barracks of all things. And that she had best be armed.
Rill had a bangle with a few materia slotted. Using them was literally in her blood, she and Aeris had both discovered a very strong affinity for magic. All she had was a Fire and a Restore at the moment. But she had yet to ignore the Planet when she had given advice, so...
"What is the meaning of this!?" A young infantryman slumped against the wall, relief filling him at the sound of the authoritative female voice and the way it made the beating stop. His face was stinging as bruising formed and breathing was rather difficult through a broken nose...
"N-nuthin' ma'am..." He peered up through swelling eyes to see that the recently promoted 3rd Class, the ringleader of his primary tormentors, Hector, was looking as though the devil had come for his soul.
"Nothing? We shall have to see. Stand aside."
There was the clicking of shoes on the floors as a blurred shadow came and stood firmly between him and his tormentors.
He felt a gentle hand on his face and hissed in pain even though the touch had been more akin to his mother's hand than anything he had felt in months. Another prod to his ribs made him bite back a groan as pain lanced through his side.
"Can you tell me your name, private?" She asked, in a much kinder voice than the cold one he had heard before. Breathing was difficult, see: painful, but he had been raised to be polite and concise whenever a woman addressed him. Besides, after what he had been enduring, he would have sung for this woman if she had asked it.
"C-Cloud...Cloud Strife." There came a soft hum and his breathing eased, some of the pain in his chest loosened up, his eyesight cleared a little. Enough to see that she had a small band around her upper arm. The SOLDIER emblem was in prominent display. She had dark blue eyes and brown hair and a gentle, extremely pretty face. In his mind, only his mother could beat her in beauty. He wondered absently how much of his current opinion was valid because he was slipping into shock...
"Lie still, Cloud. I'll finish healing you once I'm finished with them." She promised. She then looked back towards the other four SOLDIER, all of whom were looking as uncertain and nervous as he usually felt. Must be a pretty high executive. Cloud thought dazedly.
"I am afraid, SOLDIER, that you lied to me. There is very much something going on here. Or at least there will be once this is reported." She said crisply and frigidly, all the kindness Cloud had heard in her was suddenly gone. "You will have a great deal to answer for, Sergeant. Did any of you pay any attention to Commander Hewley's orientation?" There was only ashamed silence as to her answer. "I cannot hear your thoughts, speak up!" Her voice cracked like a whip and Cloud heard a mumbled chorus of negatives as to her question.
"If you had, none of you would be facing the possibility of immediate dishonorable discharge." This brought a sudden murmur from the four SOLDIER facing her as she continued.
"Those who are given the Mako enhancements are strictly and absolutely forbidden to attack the unenhanced except in self defense. Can any of you tell me why this is?"
There was only silence in answer to her question, so she spoke on.
"Because in your moment of... spirited ill thought, you almost killed this young man." The way she said it seemed to make the temperature in the hall drop. "You are fresh off your first enhancements, thus you are not thinking clearly. But rest assured, you will not escape punishment for this. Report your deeds to your Lieutenant, in full and sparing no detail. I will also be delivering a report." Which meant that they could not escape from this.
But this threat seemed to trigger something in one of the recently minted SOLIDER.
"Who the #$% are you, to order us around like we're your slaves!?" he stepped forward, looking threatening and his eyes glowing with emotion. "I didn't join SOLDIER to take orders from a skinny #$%&!"
"Stand down." She ordered cooly, not batting an eye at the man who managed to tower over her quite impressively. The others were taking their cues from their friend and were looking to resume their fun, but this time with two victims. Only one seemed to be thinking this was a poor idea.
"Greg, you can't be serious!"
Cloud struggled to rise. He couldn't let her get hurt because of him-!
"I don't take orders from either one of you!" He hissed, raising his hand to strike her. "That runt deserves what he's getting, and so will you-"
"You may not take orders from her, but you do take orders from me." The voice was unfamiliar, but it was male, and very angry. As Cloud turned his head, he saw that there was a large man striding down the hall. Dark haired and with a considerable amount of stubble, as well as a sword that looked like it weighed more than he did.
"Good afternoon Commander." The woman inclined her head as if she wasn't being threatened by someone who could have broken her in half. "I take it you wish to speak to your subordinates. I have this young man's wounds to see to."
"You are correct, Miss Thomas." Angeal Hewley loomed over the four suddenly terrified SOLDIER, his rage almost palpable in the air.
Cloud didn't see or hear what the famous 1st Class said to them, as he lost consciousness when his savior lifted him from the ground.