12

Epilogue

Reno hated 7th Heaven, he could smell the self-righteousness of the place seeping through the walls. It sickened him. He had asked, begged, Elena or Rude to come, but they shook their heads and said he had to sort it out for himself. He leant back on a wooden chair, whisky in hand and shadows under his eyes marking the sleepless nights that had plagued him. He watched the kid, his kid, out of the corner of his eye. He was sat on the floor next to Marlene, keeping her happy by being a guest at her tea party. Jasper had even invited his father to the tea party, but Marlene shook her head and refused to have "That big bully" join the fun. 'Thank Gaia.' Reno thought to himself bitterly. He hated kids.

"Yo!" Barett came in, Cloud beside him and Tifa behind, Reno sighed in relief, they must have come to a decision.

Three days had passed since the Indigo Children mess had ended, Cloud was pissed about there still being a clone around, despite Tifa insisting that he was probably the last and he was dead, so it was fine. But Cloud was still tense about it. Jennin regained consciousness fast, part of being an Indigo Child, or that's what Nyra said. But her mind did not recover so easily, the deaths of Dale and her family haunted her to an extent that she had been admitted into New Midgar's home for the mentally ill. Reno felt for her, the memory of the way she made him feel refusing to fade. Nyra and Jak had gone off together, on friendly terms. It became apparent that Dale had been a very powerful Child, he could manipulate people into thinking he was right, he completely brainwashed them. They were really decent people when they were able to think for themselves. As for the comas and deaths that had plagued Mideel enough to call Reno and Elena out there in the first place: They were caused by smaller tests Dale had tried. Mideel was slowly getting back to usual according to their grateful messages to The Shinra.

Neither Nyra nor Jak knew much about the clone, or why he had wanted the Indigo Children to do what they were going to do, Cloud suspected it was something to do with Sephiroth's desire to wipe out life that wasn't the Ancients. The Indigo Children were the new Ancients. They couldn't be sure beyond guesses though and decided it was best forgotten for now.

As for the issue surrounding Reno and his son; that had been under discussion for the longest. One minute Reno would say that no way was he looking after him. The next he was saying that maybe he'd give fathering a go. Reno just couldn't decide. His lifestyle was not one that would accept a child, yet he was very reluctant to give it up and buy a proper house in a better neighbourhood nearer the boy's school.

"Reno, we think it's best if Barret take care of Jasper…" Tifa said quietly, but Reno could tell she was enjoying it really, that she longed to just stick out her tongue and go 'nah, nah, ne-nah nah.' But he didn't care, that was what he had wanted to hear, he hated kids. Barret nodded and sat down, looking over to Jasper and Marlene. Jasper looked up, his blue-green eyes shining in the light, and came and sat on Barret's knee, staring across at his father with a blank expression.

"Did you head that Jasper, I'll be your dad for the moment." Barret bobbed him up and down on his muscular knee, smiling.

"Good. I like it here, I didn't like Reno's house one bit." Jasper had been referring to Reno by his name rather than 'dad' almost as a sign of how little Jasper thought of the red-head, Reno had adopted the name 'twirp' for Jasper as a retaliation, he thought it suited him.

"Good-good. Can I go now?" Reno sighed, sitting up in readiness to leave.

"Reno, you are still Jasper's father, nothing can change that, and one day you both might regret it if you don't see one another regularly." Tifa said, fiddling with a ribbon that had been lying about. "So, every other weekend you'll come and spend the day with Jasper, either on a Saturday or Sunday, whichever is more suitable. Got it?" From the tone of her voice there was no use arguing, but the weekends were his time and he would certainly not look forward to having to visit the boy.

"All right. Fine. Whatever." He snapped, standing up and stretching.

"So, not this weekend coming, but the one after you come here at about eleven on Saturday?"

"Sunday." Reno insisted, he'd never wake up by eleven on a Saturday morning, Sunday wasn't much more likely. Tifa nodded, annoyance at Reno's uncaring attitude towards the whole thing. Reno went over to Jasper and ruffled his hair.

"Bye twirp." Was all he said before he left the building with one destination in mind: The Pub.

THE END

Thanks to everyone who read this, and extra special thanks to those who reviewed

I would be very grateful for reviews if you managed to read it all, good, bad, whatever. I've written a few more shorter stories with Reno, The Turks, Jennin and Jasper in 'em so I'll post them as I get them edited and polished up.

Cheers for reading

So, until next time: bye!

Izzia.