Good morning/afternoon/evening readers. School's going well here, got no complaints as to classes or anything, which is nice considering it's senior year. That said, this update schedule is perfect, so expect it to continue. Chapter XVII for you.


Rude dropped into a seat in The Jade Dragon, leaned his umbrella against the table, kicked back, and waited.

He didn't have to wait for very long. After about five minutes two men walked up to him and ushered him into a back room, where bikers from the gangs had been crowded in, all of them with umbrellas.

What surprised Rude, almost to the point that he couldn't keep his expression straight, was that the guy Reno had said he'd caught and had taken to the police was still at the meeting. It was the same agent for sure.

He looked worse for the wear, with a large purpling mark on his face that spoke of Reno's prod and several other bruises that probably had been "accidentally" delivered by police. He was also favoring his left arm, but he still looked mean as hell.

"Good of you to join us," he said.

Deciding to test the waters, Rude asked, "What the hell happened to you?"

"I was caught observing what went down in the square today by a meddler. He managed to knock me out and when I woke up I was in a police station." The agent shrugged. "Fortunately, it's just a matter of having a mole here and there. The police aren't too ineffective on their own, but with people in the right places, we can hamper any effort by them to hamper us."

So there're corrupt police here, too, Rude thought. Better tell them that after this is over.

Visibly recovering his thoughts, the agent plowed on, "Let's get started, then. We're here to discuss a big move that will show the population our power and destabilize the government. Any thoughts?"

One of the bikers, a native Wutainese who had a large red tattoo of the silhouettes of a pair of crossed broadswords on his bicep, spoke up. "The boss told me to tell you that he had an idea, and this was even before the whole Prop 209 thing today. He thinks we oughta target a foreigner – a prominent one."

The agent motioned for the man to elucidate.

"See, we got some foreigners that turned native 'cause they liked the culture, or they were fleein' Shin-Ra and thought this was a good place to take refuge, but some of 'em have actually gone'n made names for themselves. If we knock one or two off, all the rest might get uneasy and leave."

Rude kept his expression neutral, though the foreign-born bikers obviously didn't like this plan, as was evidenced clearly enough by their expressions. One of them spoke up: "An' what'll we do after you pull this off, voidbrain? Some of us were actually born here, you know. We're only different 'cuz we don't look Wutainese."

"That's a moot point," the espionage agent said sharply. "I like this idea, but not simply because it'll boost the isolationist movement. If we can take out someone important, who's caused a stir, then it'll kill foreigner faith in the government. They'll start demanding additional protection, which the government will have to provide, thus creating an even larger hotbed of resentment towards foreigners in the population. When everything explodes, it'll be civil war at least." He grinned. "Wutai won't be able to muster a united government, leaving it vulnerable to all of you to take over. Our goal is accomplished, and you bikers get your wish."

"Why?" Rude asked abruptly, sensing his moment and taking it. "Why d'you wanna destabilize Wutai? You working for Shin-Ra or something?"

The agent laughed. "Shin-Ra? They couldn't find their ass with both hands if we painted it in reflective orange and gave them a mirror. No, all I'm going to say is that we're a… private party. Call us revolutionaries."

"Revolutionaries without much interest in the government after the war. Sounds more like anarchists to me."

"But we'd be actively trying to suppress all forms of government if we were anarchists, my Shattered Hand friend. Or is this some new definition of the term 'anarchist' that I haven't heard about, mm?"

Rude leaned back slightly and raised a hand, palm open, to indicate he was backing down. The agent made a satisfied noise and turned his attention back to the rest of the gathering. "Anyone else got any ideas?"

"What about Godo's daughter's marriage?" one of them asked. "We got any plans for that?"

"Special plans are already in place concerning that, we're not touching it. We have an ulterior interest in Kisaragi, so whatever it is we're doing can't involve her."

"Ulterior interest?" the swords-tattoo biker asked.

"Let's just say that we're not looking to kill or mess with her. We need her to stay undamaged, so she's off-limits to everyone."

Rude resisted the urge to frown at that. If these are the same guys who hired that team to steal the materia, what do they want with Yuffie too? Sure, the team hadn't been told not to shoot her, but why would you need Yuffie if you had the Leviathan materia?

Before he continued, the agent frowned and cocked an eyebrow, then cupped a hand to his ear. "You guys hear what I do?"

Listening intently, Rude discovered he could hear nothing but the faint drone of the television from the outside room. "Yeah. They're all watching something important."

Quickly, the agent turned around and hit the switch on the until-then dead TV in the back, and it sprang to life. Immediately, Rude again quelled shock before it could rise up on his features; Reno was on the screen.

The caption scrolling across the bottom told him that this footage was shot only minutes ago at the Council Hall of Wutai, where Proposition 209 had failed and this foreigner, apparently Yuffie Kisaragi's "consort," had made this speech on it and the issues behind it.

"I'm made of flesh and blood, same as all of you, and I bleed just like you, too. Remember this, guys, 'cause that's what all of us, Wutainese and not, are gonna do if this comes to war: bleed."

Rude stared at the crimson running down Reno's hand, and then the feed cut back to the newscaster, who commented that in more breaking news, the entire city was rallying for or against the man's speech, and that he had been tentatively identified by various sources as being named Reno and working for Shin-Ra.

"You'll bleed sooner than you think," the agent laughed. "All of you. Tomorrow evening, the day before Kisaragi's marriage is decided. I want him dead."


Karsk, after Reno and Yuffie had gotten out of the Hall, had told them that he'd see Grandpa Souta, Makoto, and Rei back to the old mechanic's place and that Reno and Yuffie could go back to her home straight away. They drove there quickly enough, making it to her house by eleven o'clock. Both of them were bone tired, but not the sort of tired where you fell over and slept to cure it.

Neither of them spoke until they reached the door. Reno opened it and said, "Ladies first."

Yuffie blinked and managed a smile before heading inside, while Reno entered after her and shut the door behind him. They stood in the cool darkness of her living room, lit faintly by the moon. Suppressing a sigh, Yuffie slumped onto a couch and motioned for Reno to sit down next to her. He kicked off his shoes, watching as she unlaced her boots, and removed the jacket he'd been wearing so he had a bit of air.

With a mischievous wink, Reno sat down to Yuffie's right and pulled her onto his lap, leaning against the back of the couch and the armrest. She wrapped her arms around him and pulled her legs in so she was curled into a shivering ball.

"You can tell me what's wrong, Yuffie," Reno finally said softly. "You know I'll listen and try to fix it up."

Sniffling, Yuffie nodded and swallowed hard to clear her throat. "What you said back there, Reno, in the Hall… It was so beautiful, and so great, but I would never have expected it from you."

He gave her a lopsided grin and replied, "Most people wouldn't."

"But it's not that simple," Yuffie said urgently, biting at her traitorously quivering lip. "There's an entire side of you that I don't know, Reno, and it seems like I'm seeing more of it every day. And now this… it was so unlike this other person, even though I wouldn't expect it from you, that it sort of got to me and made me think how paranoid I'm being. I just broke down." She looked bleakly at him, cloudy grey eyes searching vivid turquoise. "I'm not even sure if this other person I'm seeing is still you."

Reno pulled her closer to him. "You're not the first person to tell me this, Yuffie," he murmured. "Trust me, I've known about it for years. I never stop bein' me – I just start being a different kind of me."

"It scares me."

"It should. If there's serious business, Yuffie, then I'm gonna make damn sure that I treat it seriously. Normally I'm way too happy-go-lucky, so sometimes I gotta sober up and be serious." He grimaced as though from sudden pain, though that was obviously not the case. "I know it must be weird, but I can't help it. If something important's gotta get done, I'll do it, however I can." Gently, Reno took Yuffie by the chin and raised her gaze back up to meet his own. "Nothing's more important to me, right now, than seein' you through this, Yuffie. Wutai, espionage, my job, everything, all that can go rot for all I care. Not only does your dad doing this to you go against what little I try to hold myself to morally, but I also love you. I can't just sit back and watch this happen to you."

Yuffie felt more tears approaching, but she killed their impact with a smile. "You don't know how much I've wanted to hear you say those words, Reno."

He wiped the tears from her face with a hand. "If I'd known, sugar, I would've said them a long time ago. We've known each other for a real long time, but we haven't really been an item for very long, have we? I thought…"

Quickly, Yuffie put a finger to Reno's lips before he could continue. "I don't care how long it has or hasn't been. I know when I'm in love, especially when I feel this way even knowing you've got some crazy psycho side that only comes out when you murder people."

"Everybody's got quirks."

Yuffie rested against Reno while he held her, and time passed like a slow current.


Makoto watched Rei move rhythmically and gracefully across the floor of her room, a fan in each hand, twirling and flashing, here hiding her face, here concealing some part of her body – the effect not to conceal it, but to highlight it, even through her kimono and past the fan. Normally there would have been a lower-ranked, less experienced, or apprentice geisha plucking at the strings of a shamisen in tune with her movements, but Makoto played a beat in his head to fill the silence as he watched her, and she began to sing:

"Narrowed eyes in white face

Pillar of stone supplying support

Gloved hand clutches lace

Whilst gaze rests on a lady of the court."

That wasn't the entire song, of course; there was much more. Rei continued, and Makoto felt his rational side ranting at how only powerful businessmen and crime lords were lucky enough to receive private exhibition performances from geisha, while the rest of him ignored his rational side and simply sat and watched in awe.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he wondered how Yuffie was holding up, but at the same time, logic rounded on him and rebuked him for doubting Reno's reconciliatory abilities. The man was exceptional, and Yuffie had chosen him for a reason. He'll be able to soothe her. I don't want to see her sad, but… This is beyond anything I'd ever imagined.

With a final flourish of her fans, Rei snapped the implements shut and concluded the dance with a bow.

Impelled by a force beyond any reasoning, Makoto rose to his feet, crossed the room to her, pulled her to him by her hips and pressed his mouth against hers. She responded immediately, the fans dropping to the floor as she grabbed him by the front of his shirt with one hand and by the shoulder with her other, pulling him closer, closer…

"Your bike's parked outside."

Makoto nearly fell over in surprise, and Rei gave a squeak of surprise that was understandably muffled. They pulled apart and stared, hearts hammering, at the dangerous-looking figure standing in the doorway.

"Didn't hear you come in," Makoto said hoarsely, an idiot's grin beginning to pull at the edges of his mouth.

Rude tossed him his keys, which he caught out of midair, and then said, "We have problems. My 'boss' wants everyone to kill Reno tomorrow night. They know he's with Yuffie, so they'll definitely check her house. Do you think he can stay at your place tomorrow?"

"Sure." Slowly, Makoto noticed that Rude's gaze didn't rest on his face, but instead much lower, down at his belt area. The biker looked down at his waist and realized that his pants were unbuttoned.

Looking back up, he saw the patented Innocent Vixen Smile on Rei's face. "How did you do that?"

"Trade secret. We don't only learn dance, you know."

Rude cleared his throat.

Makoto blinked and shook himself out of it, taking the moment to discreetly button his pants again. "Sure. We'll make sure nothing happens to him."

"I'm afraid it may be more complicated than that," the Turk said, inviting himself in and sitting down. Makoto and Rei took the cue and sat down themselves, Rei casually retrieving a cigarette from thin air and accepting Rude's light.

"The agent mentioned one or more moles in your gang," he continued. "Sure, it's a safe place to stay, but what if all the gangs involved in this decide to join up and lay siege to your headquarters? Would it stand up to it?"

Thinking intently, Makoto finally replied, "If we could pick off enough of them when they were coming at us, then yes. But if they took us by surprise, they could storm us faster than we could react. We have underground escape routes, of course, and for our bikes too, not just us – but if there really are moles in the gang, then the exits of those escape routes aren't secure. They could even be used against us." He looked rather bleakly at Rude. "This really is going to be a war, isn't it?"

Rude shrugged. "All I know is that there'll eventually be a chance for me to ride down main street on my own armored motorcycle blowing shit up at random. Reno's got the master plan."

"With your disposition you'd think he'd be the brains of the outfit," Rei observed lightly, smoke curling from between her lips, "but you're no pushover either, are you, Rude?"

Recalling the occasion, Rude said, "Tseng, our direct superior, once told us how we complemented one another. He said I was bad at lying, but good at not telling the truth, while Reno was a great liar, but if it came down to it he'd blab any secret on the face of the earth." He blinked, slowly, behind his shades, and then added, "Plus, he couldn't build a bomb if you handed him a manual and a tool kit."

"No surprise," the geisha laughed, pixie-like. "Men never read the manual."

"Ba-dum psh," Makoto said dutifully.


When Karsk got back to his condominium, his men were all crowded around the single, dying television they had, watching the news. "You were on TV, Sarge!" Arcturus called as Karsk walked in through the front door. "So was that redhead guy!"

Barking a short laugh, Karsk entered the common room and shucked his jacket. "He did very well – performed precisely the way I thought he would. Certainly not a sophisticated speaker, but he's very driven – and charismatic, when it comes to it. Now that the Wutainese public is focused on him, the citizen who actually lodged the formal protest against Proposition 209 and by doing so broke its back will be a footnote."

Various chuckles sounded through the room, and David spoke up from the back. "You sure you want it this way, Sarge?"

Karsk nodded. "Yes. This way, our insidious enemy, whoever he or they might be, will be looking at Reno for the killing blow, not us. When Reno pulls them out into the light, we'll hit them in the flank with all we've got." His eyes shone and he beamed at his men, spreading out his hands in an encompassing gesture. "Just think, men. We're going to be able to fulfill the General's last order to the letter."

Cheers rose and Karsk let the tidal wave of noise continue for ten long, glorious seconds. At the end he raised his voice and bellowed, "ATTENTION!"

The cheers instantly cut off, and all the men in the room snapped immediately and perfectly to attention, arms at their sides, gazes straight in front of them.

Time to get their blood boiling. "WHAT IS YOUR PURPOSE?" Karsk thundered.

"SIR! TO PROTECT WUTAI!" they thundered back.

"WHY?"

"SIR! BECAUSE IF WE DON'T DO THIS FOR THEM WHEN THEY DON'T EXPECT IT, THEY'LL NEVER DO IT FOR US WHEN WE DO!"

"AND?"

"SIR! BECAUSE A SUPERIOR OFFICER ORDERED IT!"

Karsk gave a small hand signal and they relaxed their stiff postures but remained at attention, silent. "Good. Arcturus, Ayaro, I'm dispatching you two to retrieve the hidden armament stores I kept for us for when it finally comes time to fulfill the General's last order. Retrieve them tomorrow – I want all of us armed and ready to fight by the day after tomorrow, when I go to the Hancho game for Yuffie Kisaragi." He narrowed his eyes slightly and paused for a moment before continuing, to impart a heightened sense of importance to his next words. "Everything will draw to a close then – that much I'm sure of."

All the members of his battalion saluted as one, bringing their flattened palm up level with their forehead and stamping their right foot against the ground, the sound ringing out loudly and clearly. "SIR!"

"Carry on."


"Do you mind if I join you?"

Karsk started and looked over his shoulder up at the speaker, the familiar deep tones instantly informing him as to the man's identity. Water sloshed around his unclothed body as he stumbled around to give the General a salute.

"Who are you saluting?" Sephiroth asked irritably, wearing a towel around his waist until he got into the water. "We're off-duty."

"Sorry, General. Please do join me." Karsk looked back at the rest of the battalion, who were doing what could only be described as frolicking in the hot spring. Splashing one another, laughing, cracking stupid jokes – they were like children again.

Gracefully – just like everything else he did – Sephiroth slipped into the water, leaving the towel on the ground behind him. He gave a small sigh of satisfaction and ran dripping fingers through his hair. "It's been a tough occupation."

"Mm," Karsk agreed. "The locals certainly haven't been easy to keep from fomenting unrest. Godo seems to be genuinely repentant, though – I suppose it's really hit him hard how much damage he's done to his city by threatening us."

"I hear you're being put on garrison duty here until further notice."

So this is what he came here to talk about, Karsk thought. "Yes, I am. There were… complications with the brass back at Shin-Ra."

Sephiroth turned to scrutinize Karsk, the water making none of the sloshing sounds it had when Karsk had moved through it. "You don't seem pleased."

"No decor?" Karsk asked, confirming that everything here was unofficial.

"No decor."

"It's all politics," the Sub-General spat. "The President's decided to let who I prefer to sleep with affect his judgment about how to use me as an officer. I'm competent, willing to serve, and experienced – to stick me on a backwater garrison assignment for a beaten city is just a quiet way of getting rid of me, to show anyone that cares that Shin-Ra doesn't condone my particular 'perversion.'"

He heard the General snort quietly. "In my experience," the silver-haired young man said, "the interaction between people is a mystery, one I may never understand. Look at all of us here in this pond, naked as the day we were born, yet we accept it and interact normally because it's communal. I've always been different, but I've always shared many similarities to everyone else, and if you'd told me a month ago that the two of us would be having a conversation about you getting the short end of the stick for your sexuality, while we stood naked in a hot spring, I would have had the medics make sure you weren't concussed. We change, and we adapt.

"But I don't think change and adaptation are only short-term. Things change over long periods of time, and perhaps the idea that copulation with only members of the opposite sex needs to change as well – and by extension, we'll need to adapt to new ideas. I, myself, represent a change, and how the world adapts to me will determine its future." He patted Karsk on the shoulder and said, "This city can't remain this way forever. It needs to be able to change and adapt, like the rest of us – so as your General, I have one last order for you."

Karsk straightened and regarded Sephiroth. "What would that be?"

"Protect this city by any means necessary. Whether from invasion, or civil war, or corruption, make sure it doesn't cease to be." Sephiroth's eyes unfocused slightly and his tone became introspective. "I still have a lot to learn, not only about the world, but about myself – my place in it, how I'll affect its future. One day, I'll figure it all out; why I was created, what I'm expected to do. When I do, I want you to be there to help me carry out my goals – so don't get rusty on me."

Karsk smiled and saluted. "Will do, General."

Retrieving his towel, Sephiroth hauled himself out of the hot spring and padded away, back to the building they'd been provided for lodgings. "Goodbye, Sub-General Karsk. We'll meet again."

"Goodbye, General. I'll look forward to your return."

Karsk never saw Sephiroth again.