9. Wearing the Mask Again

1

He'd lost track of how many days they'd been travelling outside of Midgar, of how many settlements they'd searched, and of how many times this Turk, Reno, had threatened to kill him. These things seemed trivial compared to the escalating rage that he felt growing within his weary body.

The anger wasn't inside of Johnny because of his continued captivity - it had been there initially but had slowly dissolved over the last few days - but instead he found himself fuming over things that even in his current state he felt that he should've been able to have some control over.

Though only the Gods know why I feel that way, he thought.

The first issue was the seemingly epic battle in his mind concerning two of his newest daily routines. The question was straightforward - Was it more humiliating having the Turk hand-feed him his daily allotment of food, or having the Turk cover his face with a Shinra guard mask every morning?

The sheer degradation of having someone that you despise feeding you would seem like the obvious answer, but Johnny had a complicated history with the Shinra and their blue guard masks.

For the majority of the last five years of his attempts to sleep at night he'd had dreams in which he was back on Mt. Nibel, wearing one of those masks. No matter what else had been happening within another one of his dreams he always suddenly found himself standing on cracked, gray rock with his vision abruptly reduced to an obstructed view of a few other people in front of himself. Soon the gray rock would shimmer away and then he and the group would be on a wooden rope bridge. He'd had the dream so many times that he even knew exactly how many seconds there would be before he'd hear the snapping of boards and rope, with human screams quickly following suit.

There were, and it seemed there always would be, nineteen seconds for him to feel a wave of terror overpower him. Every second would seem a lifetime, every breath a knife in the stomach.

And then they'd fall. And then…darkness.

The worst part was that if the plunge didn't take him out of his dream and into the real world, he would simply remain there in that black emptiness. And while he was there the only thoughts that would circle his darkened mind were of his weakness, his abandonment, and of course . . . his guard mask.

So were the daily feedings at the hands of the Turk humiliating? Yes, they certainly were. But they still weren't as bad as having to endure that mask being placed over his head every morning.

I swore that I'd never wear a Shinra mask for as long as I lived. I swore that never again would I put my mind into the state that it was in on that day, five years ago. I swore that I'd let myself forget . . . and that that would finally put an end to the nightmares.

Johnny shook his head and cleared his mind, but that only brought his focus back to the other issue that was contributing to the swelling anger within.

My leather jacket . . . when that bastard forced me into this guard uniform he tossed my jacket aside.

He remembered leaving the holding cell back at the Shinra headquarters and taking one last look at his beat-up jacket, knowing somewhere in his heart that he would never see it again, knowing that the one thing that Tifa Lockhart had ever given him had been lost forever.

2

"This place is mad," Reno Joolston said to his uniformed captive, "and hectic beyond anything outside of Coupon Day in Wal-Market, but don't even think about trying to run off. It would be wise of you to remember that I am armed, and that it would mean less than nothing to me to shoot you and leave your body for some creature back out in the fields."

Johnny yawned. "Yeah, so . . . think we could get some ice cream?"

Wanting badly to smash the man's head with the butt of his gun, Reno took a breath and then continued on through the streets of Cardia. He'd searched everywhere between here and Midgar and had nothing to show for it except perhaps the daily headache that his captive was getting proficient at giving him. Up until now he'd mostly taken the tactic of ignoring the incessant banter, but after so many days wandering from town to town he was finally ready to get his hands dirty. Well - dirtier.

"No, really," Johnny said in his nasally, chipper voice, "I could definitely go for some ice cream or something. Such a nice day an' all. I mean I suppose a popsicle would . . ."

"Shut it, you slum trash," Reno said, and then realized that he was tightening his grip around the gun concealed in his pocket.

The masked man turned his head slightly as they continued to walk past the mob of consumers. "Really . . . not an ice cream fan I take it? Or is it just sweets in general?"

Reno maneuvered around a crowd of people gawking at one of the merchants. "Keep your mouth shut."

"I, myself, love sweets . . ."

"Okay, that's it," Reno said, and then grabbed the wrist of the man in front of him. A few of the people in the area saw this and were now displaying perplexed faces. After all, they were witnessing a Turk apprehend a Shinra guard in broad daylight. "We've been through I don't know how many towns and settlements over the past week or so and I've only kept you alive for one reason."

"I don't wanna hear it, I'm sick of…"

Reno cut him off. "That reason is not because I enjoy our little forays into these dirty, forsaken places. And it's definitely not because I enjoy listening to the shit that's constantly coming out of your mouth. It's so that when I finally locate the Ancient's mother and that little slum bitch that she's got with her I will have that much more reason for them to cooperate with me."

"I don't . . ." Johnny started, but Reno cut him off again.

"Of course you don't understand, you halfwit." He smiled as he looked into the guard mask. "They'll see me and their first instinct will be to run in the opposite direction, but when they see their friend Johnny with a gun pointed to his face they'll do anything I tell them to do."

"I'll tell them to run," Johnny said. "I'd rather eat a bullet then let you have them."

The Turk smiled. "If that's the case . . . I'll just shoot the little girl."

"No! Not Marlene! You wouldn't! She's innocent!"

Reno shrugged. "At this point it's not up to me . . . it's up to you."

The conversation ended with those words, and as the hours passed by he searched every nook and cranny of Cardia in silence. It seemed that this latest threat had finally done the job.

3

There were mountains and an approaching town in front of her, but the green landscape to her left seemed endless as Elmyra looked past the little girl and the farmer. Marlene and Bill had been chatting up a storm ever since they'd left the Chocobo Farm, but Elmyra had found that the long drive away from what she'd recently known as safety was forcing her to think about everything and nothing all at once.

She missed Aeris, her adopted daughter, but deep inside she knew that Aeris would be in safe hands once Marlene's father and the others rescued her from the Shinra. Not once did she ever doubt that the rescue would be successful.

There was no doubting that she missed Aeris, but it was Johnny that she was most worried about right now.

Johnny Firnock . . .

He'd been caught because of her, and now that she was out of the seclusion of the Chocobo Farm the guilt that she'd originally felt was resurfacing.

He kept saying that he was a bad guy, but he was never anything but good to Marlene and me. And now he's dead for all I know.

Suddenly Bill's voice jolted her out of her thoughts. "What's with the somber face, my purty passenger?"

Marlene echoed, "Yeah, what's with the face?"

Elmyra smiled the best that she could. "Oh, it's just a little bit of everything." She sighed and continued to glance from the mountains to the sea of grass. "Bill? Can I ask you something?"

The driver took his eyes off of the road and then looked at Elmyra. "Of course you can. Ask away."

Elmyra felt the truck's speed giving way as they neared one of the outlying parking lots of Cardia's merchant district. She needed to get this question off of her chest now before the trio entered the mountainside town. So without any further hesitation she took a deep breath and asked, "Why have you never asked us to tell you our story? Why have you never wondered what it was that we were running from?" She corrected herself. "That we are running from."

The chocobo farmer opened his mouth to answer but then closed it without saying a word.

The road was coming to an end in front of them, the numerous lots just ahead. Beyond those lay the town of Cardia and the hulking Cardian Mountains.

Bill parked the no-longer-white pickup truck and then sat back in his seat. "It's not that I never wondered," he replied, "it's just that it wasn't my place to ask."

"Not your place?" Marlene asked.

"Well, yeah," the farmer said. "I'm just a simple man leading a simple life . . . it's easier that way. And while I may not have much of that whaddayacallit . . . city intelligence, I sure as hell am smart enough to know the good from the bad. And you my friends," he paused and winked, "are certainly not bad folk. So if y'all be runnin' from something, well then I just have to believe that it ain't anything good."

Elmyra smiled. "You are a rare man indeed, Mr. Choco Bill Driggs."

"Why, thank ya," he responded, and then eyed Marlene. "Did I say something to offend you, little girl?"

Elmyra sat forward and saw that Marlene's mouth was wide open and that her tiny hands were in front of her face.

"Billy . . ." the young girl said, "you swore!"

"What? When?"

"Before . . . just now . . . maybe a minute ago!"

The farmer laughed. "Oh I see . . . well then I apologize. What exactly was it that I said?"

"You said . . . hell," Marlene replied in barely a whisper, her eyes wide.

Bill laughed again and then went to open the driver-side door. Before he reached the handle however, he turned and winked at Marlene. "And now you have, too . . ."

4

It took all of Reno's strength not to scream with delight when he saw the Ancient's mother along with the little Sector 7 girl. He kept his cool though, not flinching a single muscle, because despite the threats that he'd made to his captive he still wasn't entirely convinced that Johnny didn't have some cockamamie plan of heroism up his sleeve.

The Turk also didn't want to get too excited because it appeared that the two females were being escorted by an unfamiliar man. And while the man didn't appear to be a threat of any kind - in the Turk's opinion he looked like a shit-kicking farmer - Reno would nevertheless conduct himself as a professional.

I will not jeopardize all of my hard work just to get caught off guard now, he thought.

So instead of diving headfirst into an unknown situation, he instead said, "Bathroom break," and then followed the farmer and the two woman into what appeared to be a large pet store.

Once inside he kept his distance but made sure that he never let the trio get out of sight. When he saw them stop to talk to a couple of clerks he walked Johnny over to the restroom and then pushed him towards the door.

"Uh . . . I don't have to go," Johnny said.

Reno ignored him and then shoved him into the bathroom. He then leaned against the door, effectively trapping Johnny inside.

"Can you hear me?" the Turk asked.

The response he got was low, muffled, and all-around unintelligible, so he felt confident that he could now make a phone call without Johnny overhearing the details of the conversation.

At first he tried calling Headquarters, only to learn from a low-grade secretary that everyone was out of the building.

Including the President, he thought, unsure of what that could mean.

It wasn't until he tried Heideggar's cellular phone that he got one of the people that he had been trying to reach.

"This is Heideggar," the gruff voice on the other end of the line said. "What the hell do you want, Reno?" When Reno explained the situation, Heideggar said something unexpected. "Hold on a minute, let me get the President."

Reno was speechless.

Get the President?

Before he had time to think on this, he heard, "Well, Mr. Joolston I hear you've been working a little overtime lately."

"Um . . . yes, sir," was all the Turk could reply.

"Let me make this clear because I am on a tight schedule," Rufus said. "We're about to cross the ocean, you see."

"Cross the ocean?"

"There's no time to explain. Sephiroth is involved and that is all that I should need to say."

"I see, sir," Reno said.

The President continued, "Much has been happening these past few weeks, not least of all me coming out of whatever spell that Sephiroth had me under. So right now I'm not concerned with what you have or haven't been briefed about, or about what drove you to leave Midgar without any authorization. All that I need to know right now is whether or not you are absolutely positive that you will be able to apprehend the two females."

"Yes, sir," Reno said, turning his head to make sure that the females in question were still in sight. They were. "I will be able to detain them."

"Good. Now believe it or not I've already been preparing for a situation like this. Here's what I have in mind . . ."

Reno listened with hesitancy at first, remembering that when he had left Midgar that the President had been solely focused on Sephiroth and had been blind to everything else. But as the leader of Shinra, Inc. continued, Reno suddenly found himself believing that Rufus really was prepared for a situation like this.

This will really help in the long run, he thought. Besides whatever potential leads it could bring now . . .

He ended the call and then placed the phone back into his pocket before kicking open the bathroom door. "Break's over," he said.

"What the hell was that all about?" Johnny asked, and Reno was sure that under the blue guard mask was a face full of bewilderment.

The Turk only stared back and replied, "It's time to go."

5

"Well, that's all we need," Choco Bill said, picking up the last bag of Chocobo Greens. "Do y'all wanna skedaddle on back to the farm or would you like to walk around Cardia for a bit?"

"I wanna stay!" Marlene shouted cheerfully.

Elmyra sighed. "I'd like to stay too, honey, but I think it would be better if we headed back to the farm. Is that okay?"

Marlene considered this for a few moments and then nodded. "Yeah, I suppose that's fine."

Choco Bill laughed. "You are just too funny, little lady." He looked up and smiled at each of them. "Alrighty . . . we'll head back home."

Home, Elmyra thought. I suppose it has become my home . . . at least for now.

She looked at Bill and saw a huge smile on the farmer's face.

And what a pleasant man to share a home with.

They only made it a few steps out of the store before they heard an unfamiliar voice say, "Excuse me, sir?"

Turning towards the sound of the voice Choco Bill said, "Yes?"

A second later there was a bullet between his eyes. His lifeless corpse dropped to the ground, spilling the sack of Greens.

Elmyra and Marlene shrieked and then looked at the suited man with the gun in his hand. Standing next to him was a Shinra guard.

"No! No! No!" Elmyra screamed.

This can't be happening . . .

The armed man only smiled and then pointed the gun towards her and Marlene. "Stop your screaming or someone else is liable to get shot."

Elmyra closed her mouth and then looked around the area. Shoppers were all standing in a circle around them, unsure of what was happening.

"And don't even think of trying to run away," the murderer continued. "I may not have any authorization to kill either of you, but there is someone here that I could punish if you cause me anymore trouble."

Elmyra didn't understand - couldn't understand. Too much had happened, and all of it so fast.

It can't . . . this really can't be happening!

However befuddled that she was in her current state, comprehension dawned on her a second later when the gun-toting man removed the mask from the Shinra guard that was standing beside him.

Oh, no . . .

"I'm so sorry," Johnny said. "There was nothing that I could do . . ."

Elmyra looked into his eyes and saw sincerity in them. This didn't help matters however, especially when she saw Choco Bill's blank eyes staring up at her from the ground, a ragged red puncture carved permanently between them.

What a pleasant man to share a . . .

The old woman put her hand on Marlene's shoulder, closed her horrified eyes, and then began to weep.