Author's Note: Well, I pumped this entire chapter out waiting for my Live Gackt videos to download. So, if you download any video labelled [LIVE/TV/PV] (Song) by Gackt from ::DeathofSeasons::@kazaa.com on KaZaA, give me a hollar.
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Silver Rose 2
by Reno Spiegel
Dante@towernetwork.net
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March 7, 3078
Night. Stairway. ShinRa Building. 11:47 P.M.
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"I wonder if they know we're here yet. . ." Rude
.
.
Two days ago, Jinaisim beat the holy shit out of the guy checking to see if our bathroom was operational. He'd freaked when he'd dropped into the stall, and gone into his set mode of killing. Given the fact that bathroom hadn't been checked in years, according to the state of it, we didn't bother to hide the body or anything, just threw it outside under the parking ramp. Also because of that, we decided not to worry about hiding ourselves; no one from headquarters would come to look for him, just report him missing and fired.
Jinaisim Makau, as you know, is the former husband of the late Kala Makau of Mako Dreams, killed in a "freak accident" involving all but two of the people with us. He's been our outside/inside contact for these past two years, and, as Turner did, took off work at ShinRa to come help us. Working on the inside, on our team.
We're sitting on the steps of the ShinRa building, you know the ones off to the left of the main entrance that go almost to the top? Mark had to stop twenty floors up, understandably, and catch his breath. After that, he managed to struggle the rest of the way up with little hassle. Dais is in the main office, keeping them occupied with questions, dressed as a respected businessman from Icicle Inn.
We're here tonight to set up the main bombs.
I lick my lips nervously and look around. Reno is, as quietly as possible, knocking chips out of the wall so we can insert one of the smaller bombs into it. No one uses these stairs for actual business, only if they need a second way up, and even then they're not too worried about being observant, so we don't feel we'll have any problems with it. Rude is outside keeping watch, standing in his usual Turk position in his suit so he doesn't look suspicious. Mark is watching with some morbid interest, Reno's setting the explosives, and I'm making sure all of our equipment for the actual mission is in working order.
Surprisingly, Reno can plan an escape.
He stands up abruptly and snaps shut the briefcase he had been carrying the crystal explosives in, brushing himself off and looking at me expectantly. "Everything check out? Last thing we need's for some dumbass like me to botch this and give the rest of you non-working grappling hooks."
I give him a thumbs-up and put the hook I'd just been checking back in the bag I'd brought along, picking the Masamune up next. "All checks out. If we're quick about this, we could have it all done in a week, tops."
Speak of trouble, the door about a floor up slams open and hurried footsteps quickly carry a line of SOLDIERS into our eyesight. "Goddammit," I hiss, getting into my stance. The first looks nervous, and pauses for a moment, as if looking for guidance. I solve it for him, impaling him on the sword and pulling it back out in the flick of a wrist. He falls down the stairs silently, thudding until he hits the next landing down. Someone must have tipped them off we were here.
It's about this time that it all gets blown to hell. Someone from the back lines throws a deformed grenade at us, and I soon recognize it as a teargas grenade. They blind you for long enough, and then it explodes. It must have been some really dumb SOLDIER, because a blast like that could collapse the entire staircase.
I sidestep to the right and throw myself over the railing, plummeting down at a speed that kids joke about when they say you could throw a gil from such height and it could plant into the concrete. Something tells me it might kill a person, too. I hear Reno call them jackasses and jump down after me. About two floors from the bottom, the wings unfurl from my shoulders and I sharply pull into a glide out the wide door.
Rude is outside, running for the van and firing behind him. He's also being chased by SOLDIERs. Dais is already in the van, the engine sputtering started as I glide. Reno's floating beside me, watching it as I am, but always checking behind him for reinforcements. Rude reaches the van before us and throws the side door on the back open. Reno and I crash inside, then he knocks it shut with a useful Murney de Pantra.
Dais guns it and we spin out for a moment before hauling it down the stairs and onto the train tracks. The Sector Seven train is out of order for a week or so for repairs, so it works out nicely. We reinforced the van, and all we hear when we're shot is a soft ping noise.
Then comes the blast.
The entire Plate Top is lit up by it. First goes the grenade they had thrown, blowing a large hole in the staircase by itself. There's a moment of silence before Jinaisim, sitting all the way in the back of the van, presses the detonator with a nod from our leader, the red-haired Jenova-Cetra. With the explosive mixture they put in their teargas, the three explosives we'd put on one level completely obliterate the staircase, leaving it barely recognizeable. Then the second charges go off, taking out the bottom of it.
Many of the windows, after we sit there in silence for awhile looking at our work, are shattered. More are falling out from the heat every second. We estimated eighty-some casualties if we'd done it after-hours, and I stay with that guess. There are giant holes in the building itself.
Reno's explosives pack a fuck of a punch.
I'm looking over our accomplishment with some sick fascination. I didn't want to kill all those people, did I? No, I just wanted to be a Turk to support my family. But now -- "Whoa."
Dais smirks back at me, nodding. "Fright is a lock. Destruction is the key. Insert and turn and you open your door to freedom. Buck up and realize you're one step closer to freedom." He turns back around and lights up a cigarette. That's all he needs to say, he figures. With Dais, destruction is the skeleton key. You can get out of anything with a little homicide.
Something clicks in the back of my head. I rush to the back, climbing over Jinaisim, and throw the back doors open. Fuck being seen. I stare in horror back to the ShinRa Building.
"MAARRK!!!!"
I don't think I've ever screamed louder...
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-=-=-=-
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March 8, 3078. Mark Baley, eighty-seven, died early this morning as a result of someone ratting out three ex-Turks, a mercenary, and two ShinRa workers. We were forced to blow our cover way too soon. We could stop now and go out with a blast like that, but we still have a problem: Rufus is alive and combing the city for us.
As a result, we now have to make our action quick. If we give him enough time to search and actually find us, we might as well turn ourselves right in. We're riding back to the bathroom in silence. Mostly, anyway. Rude and Jinaisim and playing a slow game of cards. Reno is driving in silence, and I'm glaring out the window. We've just been driving around aimlessly on the tracks for an hour or two. Dais is actually riding atop the van, doing whatever it is he does.
I had come, in the past two years, to the point where going to that asylum was like going to a nursing home to see my father. Now, I've lost both fathers...
We pull up to the parking garage. We're all slow to get out, except for Dais. He jumps off the top and strides in quite quickly. Reno and I don't even get out. We sit there for a few minutes in that deep, dark silence, then Reno puts it into Drive and spins back toward Sector Seven. I don't bother to ask where he's going, because I really don't care. I had promised Mark that I would let him have his moment, and I failed him.
No, whoever ratted us out failed him.
I'm about to ask Reno if he knows anything about it, but I guess I somehow dozed off in my thinking, and we're parked outside Elmyra's house. My car is parked here, too. Can't say I'm surprised, but can't say I knew about it, either. There's no rusty old truck, so apparently Cloud and Aeris aren't here. I can't see why Reno brought us here.
My fist clenches at the thought as I pull myself out of the van. I told Cloud very clearly that if he did anything, I would personally kill him, and I meant it. He seemed sincere when he told me he'd keep to that promise, and I hope it stays that way. Otherwise, he'll have some talking to do.
I pass Reno up somewhere between the van and the house, so I'm the first to the door. Reno makes no move to open it for me. There's something not right about this whole thing.
Then again, I'm always saying that, aren't I?
I rattle the knob for a moment, testing it to make sure it's real, then throw the door open. The next thing I know, I'm seeing the floor and feeling a severe pain on the back of my head. But then I'm fine, and I spin around to see a bucket on its side, water around it.
Pfft. Old trick.
Elmyra, when I turn around, winces. "Sorry, Sephiroth. It came down on your neck. Are you alright?"
She's never seemed this concerned for me, but then again, I haven't seen her since the wedding. I rub the back of my neck and nod. I don't see how it could have come down without me at least catching a splash off of it, but I suppose Reno might have seen it and redirected it, just bashing me on the neck for fun. I glance behind me. No Reno. I turn back around, and he's sitting in a chair, sipping coffee.
What the. . .?
Elmyra laughs. "Poor Seph. That must have stunned you pretty badly. You just stared straight ahead for about three minutes. Come, sit down. Have some tea or coffee, will you?"
Why does she sound so fake? I wonder this as I sit down and mutter "Tea." I rub my neck again. It's already forming into a welt. I'm having one of those periods, you know, where everything just feels like a dream and you're not actually sitting there. Mark once told me it was because one of the thousands of flashing dreams I'd had the last night predicted this, and it's like an odd déja vue.
I miss Mark already.
She has my tea ready in about a minute, then we all sit in some unconsciously agreed silence before Reno sits up. "You probably heard, we hit a little roadblock earlier this morning." It's now I realize it's extremely early, yet Elmyra's awake. I think I remember her picking up a night job, though. "If Aeris didn't call and tell you, you saw it on the news. Someone ratted us out, and it resulted in one of our men dying and another leaving to work on the case of who we were." Rolan, I think immediately. "This means we're down to five people on my end and two on yours. Sephiroth and I agreed, we don't want Aeris or Kline involved in this." Elmyra glances at me, and I nod sternly. My wife won't turn out like Mark. Kline's probably upstairs sleeping, but I can't go talk to her; never know who might come in when I'm away.
"ShinRa's got our asses if we even show our faces around the city. I doubt we could drive back to the meeter" -- what we call the bathroom we use for our rendezvous point -- "without getting picked up. But that's not the point. The point is, even with Cloud, we need at least two more people, and you have all the connections around here. Dais has agreed to pay half his own bail if we get caught, so we have extra gil. Three-thousand extra, to be exact. Do you think, if we payed you a thousand a person, you could find three guys willing and brute enough to help us out here?"
The old woman's face wrinkles even worse now, and she paces for a moment. We told Elmyra all about the plan when we'd first thought it up, and she had a list of names before, but now she doesn't look so sure. I'm convinced they're her friends and she doesn't want them to end up like Mark because of some dumbass ratting us. Protective of her friends. Protective of my wife.
But then she pulled a crinkled piece of paper from her apron pocket and hands it to Reno. "That's the address to the nightclub I was telling you about. Be careful how you get there. One, there's ShinRa spies all over the place on any given night, and two, it's rough territory." I mentally get the address from Reno.
Hellion turf.
"The main bouncer is the son of one of my friends down the road, and the drummer for the band playing tomorrow night is rumored to be an ex-convict. Both of them agreed before that they would be willing to help topple ShinRa when I asked them, so talk to them separately tomorrow night, around midnight. It opens then, and if you're lucky, you can catch the band before they go on. If not, it's a two-hour show, so you have quite the window for mistake," she tells us, slowly and calmly, but she's wringing her hands by her sides.
I stand up and put my hand on her shoulder. "It's alright, Elmyra. No one's going to link it back to you, the bad side of ShinRa won't come here again. If a man from ShinRa named Turner Rolan ever stops in, though, he's on our side. Out inside informant." Reno nods and puts the paper into his pocket.
Elmyra hardly looks convinced, but I know she trusts me to some extent now. "I believe you, Sephiroth. Just. . .don't go out and get hurt. I don't know what Aeris would do without you. Either of you." She glances at Reno. It's no secret she puts more faith in him than she does me. I'll live with it. "By the way, Aeris and Cloud are staying at the big hotel in Sector Eight. I'm sure they would appreciate it if you stopped over tonight."
The red-haired man nods, and we give our good-byes. She shakes his hand firmly, and hugs me as we walk out the door. She also throws me my keys. I hop in the car and smirk. If not for Mark, I could almost be happy tonight. I turn it on and follow Reno out to the tunnel running around the city, the one I haven't driven in for quite a while. I put on the music just for the nostalgic feel. Mako Dreams blaring through the speakers of the only car with an MKO-DRMS license plate.
I think twice and turn the radio on. I hear the whine of the AM radio tuning itself in -- I'm a big fan of late-night talk shows -- and then a jumbled mess of speaking. Then comes a slam and I realize it might be live feed from somewhere. "I told you already, this act will not go without punishment! I'm tired of answering that question, frankly!" Oh, God. Heideggar, recruiter for the Turks. "If I had any choice, I'd star -- Oh! President ShinRa!"
There's some kind of fanfare that I chuckle at, then Rufus' raspy voice silences them all. "That will be enough, Heideggar. As on official order from myself, the city of Midgar is on lockdown for seventy-two hours. Starting an hour from now, anyone wandering without purpose from ten P.M. to six A.M. will be picked up by a ShinRa officer and put in a holding cell until the eleventh of this month or until we feel the threat is over with. I will be taking no questions. I recommend you all leave before the lockdown begins."
The reporters explode into questions anyway, even while Heideggar screams at them to shut the hell up. I shut the radio off. We're about ten minutes from the hotel still, so I put it on auto-drive and lean back in the seat, driving with one hand on the wheel and the second rubbing my face. It's been a hellish night. Hopefully it won't get any worse.
I try to erase that thought, because I know if I'm hoping for that, something awful will happen. We pull up to the hotel a few minutes later, and we stride inside with this subtle quickness. Reno asks the lady at the desk for the rooms of Aeris and Cloud.
She reports them to be in two-twelve and two-eleven, Cloud in the latter, Aeris in the former. We ride the elevator to the second floor. It's the largest hotel in Midgar, so there are a hundred rooms on each floor, seven floors total. Our hotels don't get too big otherwise, but I'm just relieved they chose two separate rooms.
But my face changes to one of horror as soon as we reach those two rooms. Two-eleven is fine and in order from the outside. I hear snoring behind the door, meaning Cloud is alive and well.
But two-twelve's door is barely hanging on, and everything in the room has been somehow disrupted. I would call it a practical joke if I didn't see blood smeared on the far wall and note the window broken.
Reno backs up against the far wall of the hallway, then runs forward and slams into Cloud's room by kicking it with all he has. Cloud rockets out of bed, I hear it from here, and crashes to the floor. Reno starts screaming at him, asking where Aeris is, but in a moment the spikey-haired man, clad only in loose pants, rushes into the hallway. He barges past me into her room and keeps sputtering about how he doesn't know what could have happened.
Too late now, I think, shaking my head slowly. I don't know it now, but I'm shuddering madly, too. In the next few minutes, we're down in the lobby, Cloud still shirtless and getting odd looks from anyone who passes. Reno taps his temple and shakes his head. "Sephiroth, we're going to have to leave the recruiting to you." I look appalled, but he silences me with a finger, speaking softly with his back to the camera in the corner. "They know you're out to get ShinRa, you have been for awhile. Cloud here is completely innocent, and I'm only questionable. Besides, I have a hunch who did this anyway. I'll send Dais over in the morning to wake you up. You'll go out, have a normal day, and then you'll go meet our friends at the night club. Okay?"
But there's no room for a refusal in his tone. Basically, he's telling me I'm going to do it or there will be problems. I nod slowly, turn, and walk back toward the elevator. I hear them walk out the front. I'll be awake all night, sitting on the bed in Cloud's room, trying to think of what I can do. Eventually, I'll probably give up and go read a book.
Either way, it's a fucked-up situation.
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Silver Rose 2
by Reno Spiegel
Dante@towernetwork.net
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March 7, 3078
Night. Stairway. ShinRa Building. 11:47 P.M.
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"I wonder if they know we're here yet. . ." Rude
.
.
Two days ago, Jinaisim beat the holy shit out of the guy checking to see if our bathroom was operational. He'd freaked when he'd dropped into the stall, and gone into his set mode of killing. Given the fact that bathroom hadn't been checked in years, according to the state of it, we didn't bother to hide the body or anything, just threw it outside under the parking ramp. Also because of that, we decided not to worry about hiding ourselves; no one from headquarters would come to look for him, just report him missing and fired.
Jinaisim Makau, as you know, is the former husband of the late Kala Makau of Mako Dreams, killed in a "freak accident" involving all but two of the people with us. He's been our outside/inside contact for these past two years, and, as Turner did, took off work at ShinRa to come help us. Working on the inside, on our team.
We're sitting on the steps of the ShinRa building, you know the ones off to the left of the main entrance that go almost to the top? Mark had to stop twenty floors up, understandably, and catch his breath. After that, he managed to struggle the rest of the way up with little hassle. Dais is in the main office, keeping them occupied with questions, dressed as a respected businessman from Icicle Inn.
We're here tonight to set up the main bombs.
I lick my lips nervously and look around. Reno is, as quietly as possible, knocking chips out of the wall so we can insert one of the smaller bombs into it. No one uses these stairs for actual business, only if they need a second way up, and even then they're not too worried about being observant, so we don't feel we'll have any problems with it. Rude is outside keeping watch, standing in his usual Turk position in his suit so he doesn't look suspicious. Mark is watching with some morbid interest, Reno's setting the explosives, and I'm making sure all of our equipment for the actual mission is in working order.
Surprisingly, Reno can plan an escape.
He stands up abruptly and snaps shut the briefcase he had been carrying the crystal explosives in, brushing himself off and looking at me expectantly. "Everything check out? Last thing we need's for some dumbass like me to botch this and give the rest of you non-working grappling hooks."
I give him a thumbs-up and put the hook I'd just been checking back in the bag I'd brought along, picking the Masamune up next. "All checks out. If we're quick about this, we could have it all done in a week, tops."
Speak of trouble, the door about a floor up slams open and hurried footsteps quickly carry a line of SOLDIERS into our eyesight. "Goddammit," I hiss, getting into my stance. The first looks nervous, and pauses for a moment, as if looking for guidance. I solve it for him, impaling him on the sword and pulling it back out in the flick of a wrist. He falls down the stairs silently, thudding until he hits the next landing down. Someone must have tipped them off we were here.
It's about this time that it all gets blown to hell. Someone from the back lines throws a deformed grenade at us, and I soon recognize it as a teargas grenade. They blind you for long enough, and then it explodes. It must have been some really dumb SOLDIER, because a blast like that could collapse the entire staircase.
I sidestep to the right and throw myself over the railing, plummeting down at a speed that kids joke about when they say you could throw a gil from such height and it could plant into the concrete. Something tells me it might kill a person, too. I hear Reno call them jackasses and jump down after me. About two floors from the bottom, the wings unfurl from my shoulders and I sharply pull into a glide out the wide door.
Rude is outside, running for the van and firing behind him. He's also being chased by SOLDIERs. Dais is already in the van, the engine sputtering started as I glide. Reno's floating beside me, watching it as I am, but always checking behind him for reinforcements. Rude reaches the van before us and throws the side door on the back open. Reno and I crash inside, then he knocks it shut with a useful Murney de Pantra.
Dais guns it and we spin out for a moment before hauling it down the stairs and onto the train tracks. The Sector Seven train is out of order for a week or so for repairs, so it works out nicely. We reinforced the van, and all we hear when we're shot is a soft ping noise.
Then comes the blast.
The entire Plate Top is lit up by it. First goes the grenade they had thrown, blowing a large hole in the staircase by itself. There's a moment of silence before Jinaisim, sitting all the way in the back of the van, presses the detonator with a nod from our leader, the red-haired Jenova-Cetra. With the explosive mixture they put in their teargas, the three explosives we'd put on one level completely obliterate the staircase, leaving it barely recognizeable. Then the second charges go off, taking out the bottom of it.
Many of the windows, after we sit there in silence for awhile looking at our work, are shattered. More are falling out from the heat every second. We estimated eighty-some casualties if we'd done it after-hours, and I stay with that guess. There are giant holes in the building itself.
Reno's explosives pack a fuck of a punch.
I'm looking over our accomplishment with some sick fascination. I didn't want to kill all those people, did I? No, I just wanted to be a Turk to support my family. But now -- "Whoa."
Dais smirks back at me, nodding. "Fright is a lock. Destruction is the key. Insert and turn and you open your door to freedom. Buck up and realize you're one step closer to freedom." He turns back around and lights up a cigarette. That's all he needs to say, he figures. With Dais, destruction is the skeleton key. You can get out of anything with a little homicide.
Something clicks in the back of my head. I rush to the back, climbing over Jinaisim, and throw the back doors open. Fuck being seen. I stare in horror back to the ShinRa Building.
"MAARRK!!!!"
I don't think I've ever screamed louder...
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-=-=-=-
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.
March 8, 3078. Mark Baley, eighty-seven, died early this morning as a result of someone ratting out three ex-Turks, a mercenary, and two ShinRa workers. We were forced to blow our cover way too soon. We could stop now and go out with a blast like that, but we still have a problem: Rufus is alive and combing the city for us.
As a result, we now have to make our action quick. If we give him enough time to search and actually find us, we might as well turn ourselves right in. We're riding back to the bathroom in silence. Mostly, anyway. Rude and Jinaisim and playing a slow game of cards. Reno is driving in silence, and I'm glaring out the window. We've just been driving around aimlessly on the tracks for an hour or two. Dais is actually riding atop the van, doing whatever it is he does.
I had come, in the past two years, to the point where going to that asylum was like going to a nursing home to see my father. Now, I've lost both fathers...
We pull up to the parking garage. We're all slow to get out, except for Dais. He jumps off the top and strides in quite quickly. Reno and I don't even get out. We sit there for a few minutes in that deep, dark silence, then Reno puts it into Drive and spins back toward Sector Seven. I don't bother to ask where he's going, because I really don't care. I had promised Mark that I would let him have his moment, and I failed him.
No, whoever ratted us out failed him.
I'm about to ask Reno if he knows anything about it, but I guess I somehow dozed off in my thinking, and we're parked outside Elmyra's house. My car is parked here, too. Can't say I'm surprised, but can't say I knew about it, either. There's no rusty old truck, so apparently Cloud and Aeris aren't here. I can't see why Reno brought us here.
My fist clenches at the thought as I pull myself out of the van. I told Cloud very clearly that if he did anything, I would personally kill him, and I meant it. He seemed sincere when he told me he'd keep to that promise, and I hope it stays that way. Otherwise, he'll have some talking to do.
I pass Reno up somewhere between the van and the house, so I'm the first to the door. Reno makes no move to open it for me. There's something not right about this whole thing.
Then again, I'm always saying that, aren't I?
I rattle the knob for a moment, testing it to make sure it's real, then throw the door open. The next thing I know, I'm seeing the floor and feeling a severe pain on the back of my head. But then I'm fine, and I spin around to see a bucket on its side, water around it.
Pfft. Old trick.
Elmyra, when I turn around, winces. "Sorry, Sephiroth. It came down on your neck. Are you alright?"
She's never seemed this concerned for me, but then again, I haven't seen her since the wedding. I rub the back of my neck and nod. I don't see how it could have come down without me at least catching a splash off of it, but I suppose Reno might have seen it and redirected it, just bashing me on the neck for fun. I glance behind me. No Reno. I turn back around, and he's sitting in a chair, sipping coffee.
What the. . .?
Elmyra laughs. "Poor Seph. That must have stunned you pretty badly. You just stared straight ahead for about three minutes. Come, sit down. Have some tea or coffee, will you?"
Why does she sound so fake? I wonder this as I sit down and mutter "Tea." I rub my neck again. It's already forming into a welt. I'm having one of those periods, you know, where everything just feels like a dream and you're not actually sitting there. Mark once told me it was because one of the thousands of flashing dreams I'd had the last night predicted this, and it's like an odd déja vue.
I miss Mark already.
She has my tea ready in about a minute, then we all sit in some unconsciously agreed silence before Reno sits up. "You probably heard, we hit a little roadblock earlier this morning." It's now I realize it's extremely early, yet Elmyra's awake. I think I remember her picking up a night job, though. "If Aeris didn't call and tell you, you saw it on the news. Someone ratted us out, and it resulted in one of our men dying and another leaving to work on the case of who we were." Rolan, I think immediately. "This means we're down to five people on my end and two on yours. Sephiroth and I agreed, we don't want Aeris or Kline involved in this." Elmyra glances at me, and I nod sternly. My wife won't turn out like Mark. Kline's probably upstairs sleeping, but I can't go talk to her; never know who might come in when I'm away.
"ShinRa's got our asses if we even show our faces around the city. I doubt we could drive back to the meeter" -- what we call the bathroom we use for our rendezvous point -- "without getting picked up. But that's not the point. The point is, even with Cloud, we need at least two more people, and you have all the connections around here. Dais has agreed to pay half his own bail if we get caught, so we have extra gil. Three-thousand extra, to be exact. Do you think, if we payed you a thousand a person, you could find three guys willing and brute enough to help us out here?"
The old woman's face wrinkles even worse now, and she paces for a moment. We told Elmyra all about the plan when we'd first thought it up, and she had a list of names before, but now she doesn't look so sure. I'm convinced they're her friends and she doesn't want them to end up like Mark because of some dumbass ratting us. Protective of her friends. Protective of my wife.
But then she pulled a crinkled piece of paper from her apron pocket and hands it to Reno. "That's the address to the nightclub I was telling you about. Be careful how you get there. One, there's ShinRa spies all over the place on any given night, and two, it's rough territory." I mentally get the address from Reno.
Hellion turf.
"The main bouncer is the son of one of my friends down the road, and the drummer for the band playing tomorrow night is rumored to be an ex-convict. Both of them agreed before that they would be willing to help topple ShinRa when I asked them, so talk to them separately tomorrow night, around midnight. It opens then, and if you're lucky, you can catch the band before they go on. If not, it's a two-hour show, so you have quite the window for mistake," she tells us, slowly and calmly, but she's wringing her hands by her sides.
I stand up and put my hand on her shoulder. "It's alright, Elmyra. No one's going to link it back to you, the bad side of ShinRa won't come here again. If a man from ShinRa named Turner Rolan ever stops in, though, he's on our side. Out inside informant." Reno nods and puts the paper into his pocket.
Elmyra hardly looks convinced, but I know she trusts me to some extent now. "I believe you, Sephiroth. Just. . .don't go out and get hurt. I don't know what Aeris would do without you. Either of you." She glances at Reno. It's no secret she puts more faith in him than she does me. I'll live with it. "By the way, Aeris and Cloud are staying at the big hotel in Sector Eight. I'm sure they would appreciate it if you stopped over tonight."
The red-haired man nods, and we give our good-byes. She shakes his hand firmly, and hugs me as we walk out the door. She also throws me my keys. I hop in the car and smirk. If not for Mark, I could almost be happy tonight. I turn it on and follow Reno out to the tunnel running around the city, the one I haven't driven in for quite a while. I put on the music just for the nostalgic feel. Mako Dreams blaring through the speakers of the only car with an MKO-DRMS license plate.
I think twice and turn the radio on. I hear the whine of the AM radio tuning itself in -- I'm a big fan of late-night talk shows -- and then a jumbled mess of speaking. Then comes a slam and I realize it might be live feed from somewhere. "I told you already, this act will not go without punishment! I'm tired of answering that question, frankly!" Oh, God. Heideggar, recruiter for the Turks. "If I had any choice, I'd star -- Oh! President ShinRa!"
There's some kind of fanfare that I chuckle at, then Rufus' raspy voice silences them all. "That will be enough, Heideggar. As on official order from myself, the city of Midgar is on lockdown for seventy-two hours. Starting an hour from now, anyone wandering without purpose from ten P.M. to six A.M. will be picked up by a ShinRa officer and put in a holding cell until the eleventh of this month or until we feel the threat is over with. I will be taking no questions. I recommend you all leave before the lockdown begins."
The reporters explode into questions anyway, even while Heideggar screams at them to shut the hell up. I shut the radio off. We're about ten minutes from the hotel still, so I put it on auto-drive and lean back in the seat, driving with one hand on the wheel and the second rubbing my face. It's been a hellish night. Hopefully it won't get any worse.
I try to erase that thought, because I know if I'm hoping for that, something awful will happen. We pull up to the hotel a few minutes later, and we stride inside with this subtle quickness. Reno asks the lady at the desk for the rooms of Aeris and Cloud.
She reports them to be in two-twelve and two-eleven, Cloud in the latter, Aeris in the former. We ride the elevator to the second floor. It's the largest hotel in Midgar, so there are a hundred rooms on each floor, seven floors total. Our hotels don't get too big otherwise, but I'm just relieved they chose two separate rooms.
But my face changes to one of horror as soon as we reach those two rooms. Two-eleven is fine and in order from the outside. I hear snoring behind the door, meaning Cloud is alive and well.
But two-twelve's door is barely hanging on, and everything in the room has been somehow disrupted. I would call it a practical joke if I didn't see blood smeared on the far wall and note the window broken.
Reno backs up against the far wall of the hallway, then runs forward and slams into Cloud's room by kicking it with all he has. Cloud rockets out of bed, I hear it from here, and crashes to the floor. Reno starts screaming at him, asking where Aeris is, but in a moment the spikey-haired man, clad only in loose pants, rushes into the hallway. He barges past me into her room and keeps sputtering about how he doesn't know what could have happened.
Too late now, I think, shaking my head slowly. I don't know it now, but I'm shuddering madly, too. In the next few minutes, we're down in the lobby, Cloud still shirtless and getting odd looks from anyone who passes. Reno taps his temple and shakes his head. "Sephiroth, we're going to have to leave the recruiting to you." I look appalled, but he silences me with a finger, speaking softly with his back to the camera in the corner. "They know you're out to get ShinRa, you have been for awhile. Cloud here is completely innocent, and I'm only questionable. Besides, I have a hunch who did this anyway. I'll send Dais over in the morning to wake you up. You'll go out, have a normal day, and then you'll go meet our friends at the night club. Okay?"
But there's no room for a refusal in his tone. Basically, he's telling me I'm going to do it or there will be problems. I nod slowly, turn, and walk back toward the elevator. I hear them walk out the front. I'll be awake all night, sitting on the bed in Cloud's room, trying to think of what I can do. Eventually, I'll probably give up and go read a book.
Either way, it's a fucked-up situation.