Author's Note: Alright. I'm back, with another story. If I don't get at least one review on this thing, though, I'm pulling it. Sure, we're all a bit heated against FF.Net for the rulings, but that doesn't mean stop reading. I mean, people get on here to try and get seen and published and such. Like me. Muaha. Anyway. Read. Slightly-AU, pre-game Aeriseph -- my second favorite couple. Trying something new with my style. ( And if it means anything to anyone, yes, I do read Sheldon Siegel's Mike Daley novels. Hee. )
Silver Rose
by Reno Spiegel
Dante@towernetwork.net
October 16, 3076
Late Shift. ShinRa, Inc. 11:45 P.M.
"You'll get the promotion, or I'll have Robert ShinRa's fat ass on a platter." - Professor Hojo, ShinRa Science Department
Not everyone with relatives starts high in this company, as some may think. I'm one of these cases, as a chef behind the scenes in the executive cafeteria, but if that's what it takes to get high on the rungs of the ladder here, I'll serve burgers until my wrists rot away. What everyone considers to be my father gave me a recommendation, so they shoved me in the kitchens, handed me a hairnet, and told me to turn off the lights every night before I leave.
Held to other jobs' levels, being cafeteria worker here is like CEO anywhere else. ShinRa is just that damn good.
I walk out of the building one night, in the dead-middle of October, and sling my brown jacket on, hailing a cab to take me to the train station a few blocks down from work. Much better than walking, though, seeing as how the first frost had knocked us on our asses in surprise and it had decided to snow the next day, hard, just to spite us.
Midgar weather is like a good Chocobo race at the Gold Saucer; no one ever knows how it turns out, and those weathermen judges mean nothing here. Midgar does what it wants to do, and if we don't accept it, it seems to double the load.
The driver tosses some small talk, and I throw back with big words just to confuse him, then hop off early and pay him everything from my pocket so he won't have to kill me if I ride it all the way to the station. Drivers atop the 'Pizza in The Sky' are known to do that, have someone take them to court, and win. Screwed-up people, they are, and a poor-ass chef, I am.
I flash my business card at the ticket person and she lets me through with a smile, without gloves even in this weather. They're known for their hard attitude toward the conditions, and soft mood toward their customers. Everyone in Midgar has a reputation. Anyone who lives above the Plate automatically earns the damn-rich title.
I live in the slums.
Someone like me wouldn't be caught above the Plate by anyone famous outside of the business, though. We're stereotyped as people actually with the job I have; low-pay worker, going twelve-hour days to try and grasp onto the second rung on the ladder of success, if just for a brief moment, before we feel the load and crumble into snivelling masses of shit.
It's about this time, as I'm ready to sleep the short distance to Sector Five, that Mills O'Donnel slams down into the seat next to me.
Christ.
Mills "Lard" O'Donnel is a very heavyset man with a speech impediment, who demands to say everything about four decibals too loud. His hips are as wide as some small cars, and his breathing is always labored. Apparently, he tagged me from the kitchens. He works the grills, I take the orders. He's been at the job for eight years, everyday waiting for his promotion to come along, and is about twenty-nine right now. He got all his weight from eating the defective burgers. Poor fool demands dieting is a waste of his time.
"Hello, Mills," I mutter out of courteousy. I'm praying my tone lets him know to keep it down. This late at night, all the creeps are riding the trains home, and his breath is always steaming hot and smells like potatoes and ham.
"H - h - hey, S - Seph!"
See what I mean? And he has a feeling President ShinRa's just waiting for Palmer, the leader of the Space Program, to die out to take him to the top. I'm nice and let him keep his dreams. Father did promise me a promotion to the top of a new recruiting program, however, and I take his word, for once.
I feign a rumbling pager in my pocket and excuse myself to the phone in the back of the train. In reality, I do get on the phone, but only to check my messages at home. Sure, Mills is a good-hearted man, and I'm playing the role of a best friend until he gets one, but my shift ended ten minutes ago; I'm dead to anyone related to ShinRa except Father, the President, and myself for about twelve hours. I put in the two gil fee for the phone and get into my machine archive.
[you have. . .three. . .new messages]
A record for me, or so it seems. No one's talked to me frequently for months since I left Rocket Town and made my way here with Father. They all kind of faded from my mind, and I from theirs, and we silently called it even. I wonder how many people remember me by now?
[message. . .one]
A dial tone rings through the receiver. Someone who didn't leave a message. Most likely someone with the wrong number, or someone who didn't really need to talk to me that badly, because I checked to make sure the machine was turned on before I left. Never had that thing broken in its seven-year existence.
[message. . .two]
"S - Seph, this i - is --"
[beep]
I delete that one with a press of a finger. Mills never calls me with any news. One of his favorite games is phone tag, but it eats up a lot of my tapes, of which I have one left. Third time's a charm on my answering machine. Hopefully I got that job at the weapon shop I applied for awhile back. The old man pays about fifteen gil an hour for moving his shit around, and I need that money.
"Sephiroth, before I say this, it's your fuck-up, and I won't let it be my problem."
Come again? The landlord, whose name was never given to me, has two main rules; he does something, it's a problem. Someone else does something, it's a fuck-up. Let's see what else he has to say on my latest F-U, shall we?
"I told you, if you didn't get that rent to me, your house would be taken away from you. I tried to play fair. I gave you an extra month to get it in, and you only gave half. Not good enough, my friend. The locks were changed this afternoon. You'll find a refund of that half-size rent you gave me in the flower-pot on my steps. Already gave your name to Aeca, too, so don't go to her for a place to live. See ya 'round."
[beep]
[end of messages]
My head crashes against the steel wall of the train car, which is now rounding the Sector Seven pillar to get done to the "slum station."
Shit.
My house. The one thing I actually owned, was just taken away from me. And here I am, standing in a Midgar train, a dead phone against my ear, with the rent in my coat pocket. And let me tell you, even below the Plate, the winds can bite through flesh like razors in the winter, and all the homeless thugs have the good, warm spots outside windows of factories.
Let's see. . .my friends. . .top-ranking ShinRa executives. And if I approached them with a proposition like that, they'd stare at me, laugh, and go on their way.
It's about this time the train hisses to a stop and everyone shoves their way onto the platform, trying to get into the crowd so they won't be attacked by, of course, the local gangs. I move out of the crowd and walk around a bit. The snow's started up again, and it flakes off when my hair swings. If I stood here for a little while longer, the silver tendrils would crack off at the slightest touch.
Damn my thin hair.
I hear a noise a ways off. A young woman. . .screaming? My semi-heroic side -- you know, the one that says 'hey, go help and you might get laid!' -- gets the best of me and I trudge over in the direction of the sound, only to find her selling flowers. Long hair, pink dress, big green eyes. I've seen her walking down on Kert Street before, swinging around the lamp posts with her basket over her arm. Looked almost drunk.
"Flowers! One gil! Anybody want. . .some. . ."
She frowns, wrinkles her face. I reach down into my pocket and pull out my rent money. A hundred gil, all wrapped up in a rubber band. I toss it around in my hand for a moment, then figure out I don't need to pay rent anymore. Nothing to pay rent on.
"Sir!" She comes hurrying over to me, snow bouncing off of her shoulders, unsettled by her sudden movement. She gives me the usual street vender smile, but I have a feeling she actually looks this pathetically innocent. "Want a flower? Only a gil."
I blink, stare, and drop the wad into her flower basket, then brush past her and head down the steps, toward the year-round fountain they planned on tearing down soon. Overhanging lights glare at me as I pass, and the wind spreads whispered rumors amongst the shifty trees about me. My shadow is embarassed to accompany me when we are beneath the light.
She looks dumbstruck when I glance back. "Sir, did you miss the two zeros on the end of this?"
I pause, letting her catch up, and shrug. "Maybe I did. But no one likes zeros. Remember that," I drone, then continue forward, disappearing down an alley filled with bums. My hand slides itself into the air. "Any room in that dumpster for a ShinRa employee?"
They scatter. I take the dumpster and the newspapers they left for blankets.
This must be rock-bottom.
Silver Rose
by Reno Spiegel
Dante@towernetwork.net
October 16, 3076
Late Shift. ShinRa, Inc. 11:45 P.M.
"You'll get the promotion, or I'll have Robert ShinRa's fat ass on a platter." - Professor Hojo, ShinRa Science Department
Not everyone with relatives starts high in this company, as some may think. I'm one of these cases, as a chef behind the scenes in the executive cafeteria, but if that's what it takes to get high on the rungs of the ladder here, I'll serve burgers until my wrists rot away. What everyone considers to be my father gave me a recommendation, so they shoved me in the kitchens, handed me a hairnet, and told me to turn off the lights every night before I leave.
Held to other jobs' levels, being cafeteria worker here is like CEO anywhere else. ShinRa is just that damn good.
I walk out of the building one night, in the dead-middle of October, and sling my brown jacket on, hailing a cab to take me to the train station a few blocks down from work. Much better than walking, though, seeing as how the first frost had knocked us on our asses in surprise and it had decided to snow the next day, hard, just to spite us.
Midgar weather is like a good Chocobo race at the Gold Saucer; no one ever knows how it turns out, and those weathermen judges mean nothing here. Midgar does what it wants to do, and if we don't accept it, it seems to double the load.
The driver tosses some small talk, and I throw back with big words just to confuse him, then hop off early and pay him everything from my pocket so he won't have to kill me if I ride it all the way to the station. Drivers atop the 'Pizza in The Sky' are known to do that, have someone take them to court, and win. Screwed-up people, they are, and a poor-ass chef, I am.
I flash my business card at the ticket person and she lets me through with a smile, without gloves even in this weather. They're known for their hard attitude toward the conditions, and soft mood toward their customers. Everyone in Midgar has a reputation. Anyone who lives above the Plate automatically earns the damn-rich title.
I live in the slums.
Someone like me wouldn't be caught above the Plate by anyone famous outside of the business, though. We're stereotyped as people actually with the job I have; low-pay worker, going twelve-hour days to try and grasp onto the second rung on the ladder of success, if just for a brief moment, before we feel the load and crumble into snivelling masses of shit.
It's about this time, as I'm ready to sleep the short distance to Sector Five, that Mills O'Donnel slams down into the seat next to me.
Christ.
Mills "Lard" O'Donnel is a very heavyset man with a speech impediment, who demands to say everything about four decibals too loud. His hips are as wide as some small cars, and his breathing is always labored. Apparently, he tagged me from the kitchens. He works the grills, I take the orders. He's been at the job for eight years, everyday waiting for his promotion to come along, and is about twenty-nine right now. He got all his weight from eating the defective burgers. Poor fool demands dieting is a waste of his time.
"Hello, Mills," I mutter out of courteousy. I'm praying my tone lets him know to keep it down. This late at night, all the creeps are riding the trains home, and his breath is always steaming hot and smells like potatoes and ham.
"H - h - hey, S - Seph!"
See what I mean? And he has a feeling President ShinRa's just waiting for Palmer, the leader of the Space Program, to die out to take him to the top. I'm nice and let him keep his dreams. Father did promise me a promotion to the top of a new recruiting program, however, and I take his word, for once.
I feign a rumbling pager in my pocket and excuse myself to the phone in the back of the train. In reality, I do get on the phone, but only to check my messages at home. Sure, Mills is a good-hearted man, and I'm playing the role of a best friend until he gets one, but my shift ended ten minutes ago; I'm dead to anyone related to ShinRa except Father, the President, and myself for about twelve hours. I put in the two gil fee for the phone and get into my machine archive.
[you have. . .three. . .new messages]
A record for me, or so it seems. No one's talked to me frequently for months since I left Rocket Town and made my way here with Father. They all kind of faded from my mind, and I from theirs, and we silently called it even. I wonder how many people remember me by now?
[message. . .one]
A dial tone rings through the receiver. Someone who didn't leave a message. Most likely someone with the wrong number, or someone who didn't really need to talk to me that badly, because I checked to make sure the machine was turned on before I left. Never had that thing broken in its seven-year existence.
[message. . .two]
"S - Seph, this i - is --"
[beep]
I delete that one with a press of a finger. Mills never calls me with any news. One of his favorite games is phone tag, but it eats up a lot of my tapes, of which I have one left. Third time's a charm on my answering machine. Hopefully I got that job at the weapon shop I applied for awhile back. The old man pays about fifteen gil an hour for moving his shit around, and I need that money.
"Sephiroth, before I say this, it's your fuck-up, and I won't let it be my problem."
Come again? The landlord, whose name was never given to me, has two main rules; he does something, it's a problem. Someone else does something, it's a fuck-up. Let's see what else he has to say on my latest F-U, shall we?
"I told you, if you didn't get that rent to me, your house would be taken away from you. I tried to play fair. I gave you an extra month to get it in, and you only gave half. Not good enough, my friend. The locks were changed this afternoon. You'll find a refund of that half-size rent you gave me in the flower-pot on my steps. Already gave your name to Aeca, too, so don't go to her for a place to live. See ya 'round."
[beep]
[end of messages]
My head crashes against the steel wall of the train car, which is now rounding the Sector Seven pillar to get done to the "slum station."
Shit.
My house. The one thing I actually owned, was just taken away from me. And here I am, standing in a Midgar train, a dead phone against my ear, with the rent in my coat pocket. And let me tell you, even below the Plate, the winds can bite through flesh like razors in the winter, and all the homeless thugs have the good, warm spots outside windows of factories.
Let's see. . .my friends. . .top-ranking ShinRa executives. And if I approached them with a proposition like that, they'd stare at me, laugh, and go on their way.
It's about this time the train hisses to a stop and everyone shoves their way onto the platform, trying to get into the crowd so they won't be attacked by, of course, the local gangs. I move out of the crowd and walk around a bit. The snow's started up again, and it flakes off when my hair swings. If I stood here for a little while longer, the silver tendrils would crack off at the slightest touch.
Damn my thin hair.
I hear a noise a ways off. A young woman. . .screaming? My semi-heroic side -- you know, the one that says 'hey, go help and you might get laid!' -- gets the best of me and I trudge over in the direction of the sound, only to find her selling flowers. Long hair, pink dress, big green eyes. I've seen her walking down on Kert Street before, swinging around the lamp posts with her basket over her arm. Looked almost drunk.
"Flowers! One gil! Anybody want. . .some. . ."
She frowns, wrinkles her face. I reach down into my pocket and pull out my rent money. A hundred gil, all wrapped up in a rubber band. I toss it around in my hand for a moment, then figure out I don't need to pay rent anymore. Nothing to pay rent on.
"Sir!" She comes hurrying over to me, snow bouncing off of her shoulders, unsettled by her sudden movement. She gives me the usual street vender smile, but I have a feeling she actually looks this pathetically innocent. "Want a flower? Only a gil."
I blink, stare, and drop the wad into her flower basket, then brush past her and head down the steps, toward the year-round fountain they planned on tearing down soon. Overhanging lights glare at me as I pass, and the wind spreads whispered rumors amongst the shifty trees about me. My shadow is embarassed to accompany me when we are beneath the light.
She looks dumbstruck when I glance back. "Sir, did you miss the two zeros on the end of this?"
I pause, letting her catch up, and shrug. "Maybe I did. But no one likes zeros. Remember that," I drone, then continue forward, disappearing down an alley filled with bums. My hand slides itself into the air. "Any room in that dumpster for a ShinRa employee?"
They scatter. I take the dumpster and the newspapers they left for blankets.
This must be rock-bottom.