Jade, Wine, and Turk training
By Kimetara
Multi-part
Disclaimer: Nothing has changed since the last chapter, `kay?
Chapter 7: Invitations and fire
Reeve tapped his foot impatiently. Yuffie's personal phone had been busy for the past 10 minutes!
"Hey, Yuffie here!" The 20 year-old's voice chirped cheerfully over the phone line. "Who's this?"
"Yuffie! This is Reeve-"
"REEVE?!" Yuffie shrieked. "OH MY GOSH!"
Reeve winced. "Uh, yeah, hello to you too."
"Sorry!" Yuffie quickly apologized. "I just wasn't expecting you to call...so how is everything?"
"Everything's fine, how are you?"
"Well, I'm Lady of Wutai now," Yuffie stated proudly. "That's why my line was so busy, you wouldn't believe how many calls I get!"
Reeve chuckled softly. "You'd be surprised. I'm the president of Shinra, remember?"
"...oh yeah! Hehe, my bad. I usually don't pay attention to affairs outside of Wutai," the Lady of Wutai explained.
"Yeah, I noticed. Hey," he continued, before Yuffie could become indignant, "guess what?"
"What?" she asked suspiciously.
"Barret and Elmyra are getting married!" Reeve immediately yanked the phone away from his ear.
"OHHHHHHHHHH MY GOSH! REALLY?! ARE YOU SERIOUS?!!! WOW! WHEN, WHERE??? REEVE!"
"Yes, Yuffie?" Reeve replied, warily replacing the phone next to his ear.
"Well??? When, where, tell me!" she demanded.
"February. I don't know the exact date, and I don't know where, but it's in February. Barret said they'd send out the official invitations in a next month, but he wanted all of the old AVALANCHE team to know ahead of time, since we're all pretty busy," Reeve explained.
"Wow, that's just sooo sweet! A weeding in February!" Yuffie gushed. "I can't wait for the invite! But you know Reeve, it's been nice talking to you and all, but I really need to go. I've got a meeting with the town advisors." Reeve could hear Yuffie rolling her eyes. "As if I need advising!" she declared, her tone offended, but she ruined it by giggling. "Anyway, gotta go! I'll talk to you later!"
"Yeah, b-" Reeve didn't finish his good-bye; Yuffie had hung up.
Reeve took a deep breath. "Wellllll, at least that's over with..."
~~~~~
Josh stared into the fire, brooding.
*Stupid, stick-up-his-ass Turk,* he thought, as he carefully added another piece of wood to the blaze. *Hell's demon, that's what he is.*
Josh remembered the time when the Turks were the most feared of Shinra's forces. Feared by everybody but his kind. The kind that lived in the worst of the cities, that dug through the trash for food, that murdered and stole before they were four feet tall – or were murdered in turn.
*We never feared the Turks,* he mused. *Hell, we faced death everyday; why worry about a hidden threat?*
The blond man sat back onto his heels. *I'm surprised I lived this long. Heh, I've even got a job to go back to, once I finish this one.* Josh grinned, a slight amount of malice tainting the usually harmless expression. *Haha. Stupid Turk. He ain't going back to anything after this job. Nobody wants a Turk. Let him act as if he's on top. I know he's got nothing now. Wonder when he'll realize it and get off that goddamned pedestal of his? Probably never. A Turk's a Turk.*
Josh tensed at a flash of movement seen from the corner of his eye, only to realize it was Reno. Still, he didn't relax. He, like most everybody else, could never relax around a Turk. It was just the aura they gave off.
"You got any food in this piece of junk?" Reno's voice sounded distracted to Josh.
*Hmm...whatever happened in that truck must've shaken him up a bit.* Josh shrugged. If the Turk wanted to mess around with the prisoner, it wasn't his problem. Too bad he couldn't have a good fuck with her though; her body was a killer...
"Hey! What, you can't hear same way you can't think?" The Turk was suddenly right next to Josh, yelling in his ear.
Josh glared. "What the hell's your problem anyway?" he grumbled. "And yeah, it's in the driver's compartment."
Reno nodded and headed toward the truck, his hands in his pockets.
*Fucking think-they-know-everything Turks...*
~~~~~
Cloud yawned and stretched, ready to hit the sack, when the phone rang.
*Maybe I won't answer it...aw heck, might as well.* "Hello?"
"Cloud?"
"Yeah, this is him. Who's this?"
"Cloud! This is Reeve, how are you?"
"Oh, hey Reeve," responded Cloud, thankful he'd decided to pick up after all. "Everything's fine over here. What's up?" he asked casually, sitting down.
Reeve thought for a second, absently tapping his finger on his desk. *Let's see, how am I going to do this...uh...honesty's the best policy, right?* "Barret wanted me to invite you to his wedding, waddaya think?" he suggested in a cheerful voice.
There was a pause on Cloud's side of the line. "...a wedding?"
"Yeah! It'll be a lot of fun, you should go!" Reeve urged.
"...I don't know, Reeve."
"Come on, Cloud." Reeve sighed. "Look, it's not only a wedding, but a sort of get-together. We haven't seen you in four years! You ought to come."
"..."
"...Cloud...Aeris would have wanted you to come," Reeve spoke softly, unsure whether it was a good idea to mention the dead Ancient or not.
"...so who's Barret getting married to?" Cloud finally asked.
"Elmyra! Wow, huh?" Reeve answered, reverting to his "happy" tone. *Aeris' adopted mother, oh boy oh boy, let's see how he takes this.*
"Elmyra? That's good. Barret'll take good care of her," Cloud commented thoughtfully, remembering the dark man's tender care for his daughter. "...yeah. Sure. I'll come."
"You will?! I mean, that's great! Can't wait to see you there!" Reeve chirped, then hung up as fast as he could before Cloud could change his mind.
Cloud stared, bemused, at the tone emitting from his phone, before grinning and hanging up.
*Wow, I'll finally see everybody again. Maybe Tifa will be there...* Cloud hoped so. He'd been worried about his best friend since she left, and even felt slightly guilty. *Guilty? I don't have anything to be guilty about. Hey, her problem if she can't take me loving Aeris,* he thought defensively, before catching himself. *Ugh. Don't wanna go over that again. `Sides, time to go to bed.*
~~~~~
Reno flopped onto the seat and popped a random CD in.
~ Hey, you got the look of a lonely woman's eyes
What'cha thinking when you're standing so close to me
Ain't no law says a man can't fantasize
There's a secret locked up in you tight
Ooh, I'd love to turn the key ~
The redhead shuffled around the driver's compartment. *Where is that food...*
~ Whoah, playing with fire
Whoah, fighting my desire, baby
Whoah, my conscience is a liar
Oh Lord, have mercy on the shameless sinner ~
*There.* Reno reached in and found some stale bread and fairly old chicken. He shrugged, it wasn't Tifa's cuisine but hey, he'd eaten worse.
~ Whoah, playing with fire
Whoah, walking on a wire, now I
Whoah, I face the crucifier
What'cha doin to me ~
With a snarl, the Turk flipped the CD player off.
AN: Don't worry, Reno/Tifa should be coming up soon... "Playing With Fire" belongs to Richard Marx. In fact, I think I'll be having a few more of his songs incorporated into this fic, because I like his lyrics. His music, on the other hand... ^^;; Well, R&R!