Hold on
Chapter 11 - Help arrives
Angel015
White walls, cages, lab coats. Everything around the small boy made him scared, petrified even, as to what could happen, what he knew was going to happen.
He was sitting in a small cage, thick bars surrounding him. He was on the floor, and could only see feet walking past every now and again. He was too scared to move and try and look up, afraid of what he would see. Glancing around he caught sight of another 'experiment' in the cage next to him. Only a small child, couldn't be more than a few months old, was curled up. His, or was it a her, he couldn't tell, skin was a dark blue colour, and what looked like the gills of a fish were on... it's... chest. The boy shook his head. He was turning into one of them. ...On his chest. Yes, it could be a boy for now, he'd try and find out later.
For some reason, he had taken a small liking to this little child. For the first time in... who knows, he smiled softy, watching the small chest rising and falling gently.
"Hello." A Silky voice drew him from his thoughts. Snapping his head to the voice, his blue-green eyes widening, he stared into a pair of glowing red eyes behind a sinister mask.
***
A sharp gasp echoed in the dark room, as blue eyes once again shot open after another nightmare of his past. Of all his seven years imprisonment as a child, that was the one day he never wanted to remember again. He didn't really want to remember any of it, but, that day, that one day. He shuddered. The small child, as he found out later, was born with fish genes in his makeup. Which explains the gills. But of course, out of the water he could not survive long. As the five year old Reno sat and watched the child sleep, his breathing could be seen slowing and becoming shallower, until, and hour later it stopped altogether. He had died, right in front of him.
Reno remembered the horror he had felt at that moment, then the sadness.
He tried to push the thought, the memory from his mind, staring down at Tifa's peaceful face. He was the lucky one. The one who had gotten away, and had survived, the longest surviving experiment.
Stop. Thinking. About. That.
Forcing his mind away from anything to do with experiments, evil scientists, and red eyes, he thought about what had happened earlier that day. Or yesterday now.
Both Emily and Tifa had called whoever they could think of to help them yesterday evening. Although he was looking forward to seeing most of them again, it meant the hyperactive princess was coming. It's not he didn't like her. She just had a tendency to jump him whenever she saw him. And with a broken leg and a healing rib, being jumped on was not going to help in the slightest. Although what they had done earlier didn't exactly help. His leg seemed to be aching more than usual. Ah well, he was used to it.
He sighed, propping himself up on his elbow, staring down at a certain brunettes peaceful face.
Hang on.
Tifa had called Elena for help. He remembered that even though he was in a drowsy on painkillers, not-really-paying-attention state at the time. And that meant... Tseng was coming. Great. This is going to be awkward. Well everything is going to be awkward, but Dot-face? Crap.
A groan-like yawn broke free from the redhead, and he considered going back to sleep. But the room slowly becoming lighter and the thought of another nightmare put him off the idea. The thought of coffee was becoming more and more enticing, but then there was the trouble of attempting to get to the kitchen without waking the girls.
So instead he quietly watched Tifa sleep peacefully, playing with a piece of her long hair, a content smile playing on his face.
The sun slowly rose, filling the room with a soft light though the front window, the house was peaceful, for once.
"TIFA?" a high pitched voice rang out, the front door creaking open. The two sleeping girls were shaken awake by the voice.
"Yuffie." Tifa growled, not quite awake.
"Where is everyone?" Another voice asked, and a small ruckus involving someone tripping over something -sounding a lot like pots and pans- in the kitchen.
"Great, as if the house wasn't falling down enough as it is." Emily muttered from the floor, before attempting to push herself up, failing, still tired, dropping back to the makeshift bed ungracefully.
Reno groaned, picking up a pillow and pulled it over his ears. "It's too early for this." Tifa nodded, snuggling up to her boyfriend, wrapping both arms around him, playing with his long hair, which was, for once, taken down from the usual ponytail.
"Yuffie, be quiet, they may still be sleeping." Elena's voice drifted in from the kitchen.
"At least she has some sense." Emily muttered from her spot where she had dropped. The door to the living room creaked open, and, not caring who it was, Emily reached for a pillow, chucking it, over the top of the cuddling couple, at who ever had walked in.
"Ow."
Reno and Tifa let go of each other, moving to look over the back of the sofa at who had been hit.
Yuffie.
Tifa giggled. "Good shot." She said back at Emily, who had curled round another pillow with her eyes closed tight.
Yuffie caught the pillow, glancing up at the occupants of the room, glaring.
"Right, whoever did that is going to -" she cut herself off, seeing just who was raising an eyebrow at her over the back of the sofa. Her brown eyes widened, her voice, for the first time, seemed to be failing her, mouth opening and closing like a goldfish. "No...way..."
The redhead grinned at the gaping princess. "Kinda reminds me of your reaction. Miss Goldfish." He murmured to Tifa. She turned to him, a mock glare on her face.
"I'm sorry, what did you just call me?" She growled, under her breath. She tackled him so his back was against the armrest, leaning over the edge. She pinned him down, leaning close so they were nose to nose. Reno grinned. "You will pay."
Yuffie was still shocked immobile, mouth hanging open. A clawed hand on her shoulder drew her from her stupor. She looked up, seeing a lot of red and black and then - "Vincent." She breathed, eyes still wide. He simply nodded, eyes on the scene in front of them. There was a fair bit of commotion behind them. Elena had gotten her foot stuck in a hole in the stairs, and, looking quite cute and helpless, the boys, i.e. Cid and Barret, had gone to help, with Tseng in the background rolling his eyes.
"H-hey! What part of broken rib do you not understand?" Came a voice from the next room, making both Elena and Tseng stiffen, staring at each other in shock. Everyone was silent, still as a statue.
"It can't be..." Elena breathed. She yanked her foot free, much to the annoyance of everyone else, who had tried and failed to help, and shot like a rocket over to where Yuffie was standing. "No way..." her hands covered her open mouth, hazel eyes wide at the scene in front of them. "Reno...?" This came out slightly louder than she had intended.
The pair on the sofa were, by now, struggling for the hair band Reno had taken from the brunette as she attempted to put her hair up, hanging over the armrest, Tifa reaching out for the tie, trying not to hurt the redhead again, one arm on the armrest, the other stretching for Reno's hand above his head. At the voice, both froze. Reno grinned sheepishly, turning his head slightly to see everyone standing in the doorway.
"This is going to either be really, really awkward, or really painful." He murmured to Tifa, low enough so no one else could hear. Tifa chuckled quietly, causing him to glare half-heartedly at the sniggering girl.
Elena felt like she was going to burst. Too many emotions were running through her at the sight of the grinning redhead. The initial feeling was, of course, happiness. She felt like the heavy burden had been lifted, letting her breath for the first time in weeks. Obviously, there was disbelief. After all, she had been the only one with him when the helicopter had crashed - even if it was only over the phone-, she had thought for sure he had died. Tears began to prick at her eyes, blurring her vision slightly.
A sudden hand on her shoulder made her jump, visibly. She looked up to see Tseng, a thoughtful look on his face.
"I had thought so..." He muttered, as he watched the cocky redhead gently push Tifa off him, hand her hair tie back, sitting up.
"You knew?" The small blonde asked.
"Not really. But I had my suspicions, Rufus wasn't doing the best job of hiding it. From me anyway." Tseng explained in a low voice. Elena tried to swallow the lump in her throat, turning back to Reno, who had limped round the sofa, leaning against it, raising his eyebrows at the group.
The room had gone silent, other than the shuffling from the floor.
"Well, this is awkward." Came the mumble from behind. All looked to see Emily, who had finally dragged herself from the safety of the covers. She pulled on a pair of boots, still in her clothes from the day before -they were all too tired to bother with changing- her knee length black and white patchwork skirt and a dark plum turtleneck. She looked rather irritated, eyebrows furrowed and a scowl that could put Sephiroth to shame. She dragged her feet to the crowd by the door. "Move." She ordered. Everyone swiftly jumped out the way to let the grouchy girl through.
"Okay...Emily...not a morning person." Reno muttered, looking quite scared himself. She had always been up before him, -painkillers caused him to sleep in late- and had always had coffee beforehand, so he had never really seen her when she initially wakes up, before the caffeine .
"I think that's a little bit of a under exaggeration." Tifa said, leaning on the hard back of the sofa.
"Reno..." Elena was finding everything a bit much, tears were silently streaming down her pale face. She tried holding in a sob, but some escaped her, in a weird sounding hiccup. Reno sighed, pushing himself up slightly. He held out a hand to the silently crying girl.
"The one and only...Come on." He said quietly, smiling. Elena let out a proper sob, running forward into the redhead's arms, which wrapped around the slim form, one hand stroking her hair gently. A Grimace passed over his face at first, he did still have a few broken bones left, but a soft smile soon graced his features.
Tseng raised his eyebrows at the out-of-character Reno. It was strange, like someone had replaced him, but something inside his mind told him the redhead would be back to his usual cocky self once this blew over. Rufus had been rather careless in hiding the information about Reno and what had happened. Knowing him, he had probably left it on the desk on purpose. Elena's reaction meant she probably hadn't found anything herself, although she may have, choosing not to think anything of it, as Tseng had done at first.
It was only once Elena had taken a step back, wiping her eyes, that Yuffie regained her senses, finally closing her mouth. A Grin broke out on her face, brown eyes sparkling. She launched herself at the two TURK's, locking them both in a tight hug.
"Ow." Reno muttered, as the human rocket hit them both, smiling all the same. He felt another pair of arms wrap around him from behind, and he could feel Tifa nuzzling the back of his neck. He managed to catch Tseng's eye in amongst everything, and mouthed 'HELP' at him. He had three girls attached to him, and his reputation was going down in flames. The black-haired man simply grinned at him, not moving to assist the crushed man.
Finally Emily came to save the day.
"Hello." She sing-songed, pushing through the small crowd. Everyone moved away, cowering in fear of the small, yet deadly, girl. Yuffie and Elena moved quickly, rocketing around the sofa to peek over the top. Only Tifa stayed where she was, kneeling on the couch, her chin atop the mess of red hair.
Emily sighed, a two cups of steaming coffee in her hands. "Relax, I've already had two cups of coffee, I won't bite anymore."She said, handing one of the cups to a smirking Reno, and the other to Tifa.
***
A good hour later, after everyone had gotten over the shock, they were all sitting round the small coffee table, with the addition of Mizaki and Katashi, as Emily tried to explain just what the heck was going on.
"Okay, then, so we have to go and get Cloud and Rude out of the Prison right?" Cid confirmed.
"Basically, yeah...Which is why we called you. We can't do it on our own, because of his leg, it's only me and Tifa, which could work, until we hit the guards." Emily explained. "So we need more people to go down, a few to help keep the guards at bay, another to get the pair out of the cells." She paused, thinking. "There is also the problem of Fumiko..."
Reno counted himself lucky that everyone was looking at Emily, 'cause he was sure his face just darkened a few notches, though the dark aura could be a problem.
"And of course her 'loyal' followers." Tifa put in. "Didn't you mention one in particular?" She asked Emily.
"Yeah, Seyroth. He's her favourite. Really quite powerful too. Good fighter." She dropped her forehead onto her coffee mug. "He's going to be a problem."
"So what we're also doing is overthrowing Fumiko?" Elena spoke up. "You said she wants to take over the world, so that might be a good idea."
"We need a plan." Emily muttered, lifting her head. "Only a basic one, just so we all know what we're doing. And whatever that plan is, I think I know the one person who would want to be the one to go after Fumiko." She raised an eyebrow at a certain redhead, who raised both his in return, before furrowing into a frown.
He pushed himself up. "I think I need some air." He muttered, stepping over Tifa and Elena and moving for the door, shoving his hands in his pockets. Tifa moved to go after him, but a hand on her knee stopped her. She looked back to see Elena, who was looking at Emily with confusion clear in her expression. She ignored the hand, pushing up and following the redhead out the room.
Nobody seemed to move, save Emily who was nursing her cup of coffee.
"I'm Assuming you know why Reno has some sort of grudge against her." Tseng said finally, breaking the silence.
"I don't know much, but I do know he had a little run in with her as a child. But I just thought we would need to work that fact into our little plan." She smiled, taking a sip of coffee.
***
Tifa found the redhead in the small, covered backyard, sitting slouched on the bench, head dropped back with his eyes closed. He looked...peaceful. And for the loud-mouthed TURK, that was a rare sight.
"Hey, you okay?" She asked softly, sitting down next to him. He mumbled a reply, sounding like 'yeah' but she couldn't exactly be sure. She sighed, taking his hand, twining her fingers with his. "If you want to talk, I'm here." She said quietly, leaning back and resting her head on his shoulder, letting her eyes close.
The cold winters wind blew against their back, through the gaps in the wood. Tifa shivered, tightening her hold on Reno's hand. She could feel him shifting slightly, then a warmth spread through her. She opened her eyes and saw he had opened his wings, wrapping one around her, protecting against the biting wind.
"Thanks Tifa." He muttered. He opened one eyes when he felt her shift in the hold. He had to hold in a laugh when he saw her face. Looking like a little cat, curious and interested, she was stroking the soft feathers, a smile beginning to play on her face.
"How do you hide them so well?" She asked quietly.
"They fold in pretty tightly, and it's one of the reasons I usually leave my jacket undone, other than the whole 'I-don't-do-smart' thing." He chuckled, remembering all the times Tseng had tried, and failed, to get him to wear the uniform correctly.
"Ah." She paused, thinking hard about how to phrase the next sentence. "You don't have to answer, but what do you remember? About this place? And..." She trailed off.
Reno sighed, closing his eyes. "Not much, I tried to force it out of my head for so long, there's little I do remember." He looked down at her. "Though when we were in the prison cells, The part Emily was explaining, about how the experiments were kept, I did keep seeing it how it used to be. The rooms were filled with cages, guards at every door. Making it impossible to get out, even if you tried. The guards, at least the stronger ones, are her most successful experiment. They're human, but mechanical. A mix of the two. Meaning they are very strong, and can still learn new things."
"So if they can think for themselves, why do they still work for her?"
"Loyalty, she created them, they work for their creator."
"One last thing, how did you get out?" It was the one thing she couldn't quite get her head around, if there were so many guards, and they were so strong, how did a seven year old boy slip from their grasp.
"They had no use for me, so when they went to...kill me, they did the stupid thing, by doing it by letting me fight the guards. Outside." He chuckled. "That was the one good thing I can remember, their faces as I flew off."
Tifa smiled, leaning her head against his chest. "I'm glad you did." She muttered, smiling. Though she tried to fight it, another shiver shook her body. Even the thick barrier of feathers wasn't keeping out the cold winter air.
"Come on. It's getting a bit too cold out here." Reno said, folding his wings in and sitting up. As Tifa moved away a little a loud crack was heard. She looked at him in confusion.
The next thing they knew, they were on the floor, the bench having given way under their weight. Reno was the first to laugh, followed by the brunette.
Laughing, they made their way into the slightly warmer house, trying to clear the giggles before going into the living room, where everyone was gathered.
When they finally staggered in, Emily looked up, a grin on her face.
"I see you're finally back. We have a plan."
A/N: Here you go, chapter 11. Wow, I'm starting to get these out fast now. Three chapters in two weeks, I think. Maybe not the best idea but I really just want to get this out now. There is still a few more chapters to go. Again thanks to the people who reviewed, it would have been nice to get a few more, but never mind. If you do get this far, even if you don't have an account, please leave a review, even if it's only to say how good/bad/utter crap this chapter is. Thank you ^^ I am tempted to just abandon this story after the next chapter if I can't get to at least 45 reviews, College is starting next week, and I've got a lot to do, especially as I have to retake a AS English exam, so any contructive critisism would be much appreciated.
I'm sure I mentioned this before but I have changed chap.1 a little, it makes slightly more sense than before, as the storyline did take a sudden turn. If you think any more chapters need changing and/or improving please leave a note/review to say so. ^^
