.

23. Rod – Failure

"How the fuck could this happen?" Rod demanded. "They snatched her off the fucking street? Bullshit. Bullshit!"

Kakutou's face held as much expression as a totem pole. "Evidently some associates of the SOLDIER candidate in custody decided to make a decisive move against us in an attempt to get him back."

"They were gonna ransom Naifu for him?"

"Evidently they thought, as a female, she'd be the easiest mark."

Rod had seen what was left of the guy in the crate. "Well evidently they got that wrong," he said, mimicking Kakutou's tone. The guy sounded so much like a cop it made him sick. He had no love of that kind of law enforcement and hated it when Kakutou reverted to type.

The drugs the bastards gave Naifu had worn off early. Not having her weapons on her hadn't inhibited her ability to fight back like they had hoped. She had made mincemeat of her guard before making a break for freedom. Too bad the guy had been built like a brick shithouse and beaten her six ways from Sunday before she shattered his nose with such force it sent bone fragments into his brain. Desperation lent her strength she didn't usually possess, but that had leeched from her when she hit open air. She was nearly done by the time Rod, Legend and Kakutou found her.

Rod glanced at the ceiling. Legend's house had multiple guest rooms. In one the man himself and a Shinra medic were working on Naifu, putting her back together as best they could. He had slapped her with his Phoenix Down at the scene, yanking her back from the brink, but only proper healing techniques were going to restore her to full strength, or even half strength. She had taken more than an average beating. The cowards who saw her going to the bakery to buy muffins for breakfast had obviously resented Shinra for its treatment of their pal, and taken their frustrations out on her while she was unconscious. She had gone into the crate-fight already injured, her insides damaged in ways Rod couldn't understand, but which still made his blood boil.

He had thought coming to the Costa del Sol would be a break from always looking over his shoulder. Alejandro hadn't yet made good on his threats, but rather than reassure Rod, it had only made him increasingly uneasy. Naifu made jokes about his twitchiness, but she didn't understand the real reason behind it. Rod's pride wouldn't let him tell her the truth – that he, the big bad Super Turk, was scared of threats made by some two-bit nobody gangbanger in a Midgar slum. He would be laughed out of the department. Rod had an overdeveloped sense of pride. Letting his colleagues know his old friend had threatened him would only compound the blows it had already taken, especially since nothing had actually happened since that conversation in the alley.

The extended mission out here had been a welcome break, even if it was technically still work. At least out here Alejandro had no influence. Rod had thought he could relax for a few days.

Naifu wasn't a bad partner. She wasn't a bad person, either. Rod had grown … fond of her. Unexpectedly so. She could be annoying as a stone in his shoe, and sometimes he wanted to stuff a sock down her throat just to make her stop talking, but she was the best partner he had been given during his tenure as a Turk. Their fighting styles and weapons complemented each other, as did their personalities. Where Rod was introverted, Naifu effervesced. She took informants off guard, her open manner getting them to reveal more than they might have otherwise. Rod intimidated them with silence and sudden, short bouts of noise and violence. Where she wanted to rush in like a fool, he stood back and assessed the situation first. Where he looked like what he was – a serious threat to anyone who crossed him – her tiny shape and infectious smile constantly made opponents underestimate her. As a team, they worked.

Except for today. Today he hadn't been there while she was getting the shit kicked out of her by people who shouldn't have even been able to touch her. That bothered him. He didn't like the feeling.

You could have sharpened carbon steel on his tone. "I fucked up."

Kakutou frowned at him. "How?"

"I should've been there."

"Don't be ridiculous. She went out for muffins. None of us knew what was going to happen."

"I should've been there," Rod said stubbornly. "Partners are supposed to stick together."

Some people have the ability to communicate 'oh-for-crying-out-loud' with just the downward tick of their mouth. Women mainly, but Kakutou was part of the small male contingent who could also do it. "As I've been told repeatedly, our female colleagues don't need protecting simply because they're female. Chivalry isn't something wholly embraced by Turks."

"That's not what I meant," Rod protested, at the same time wondering whether that was part of it. Was he getting all protective – such an alien feeling it made his skin crawl – because Naifu was a girl? Maybe. He had never endured gallantry before. It felt kind of like measles. "I'm her partner. We're supposed to watch each other's backs."

"In the field. Not on the way to buy baked goods."

He grunted.

Kakutou watched him, expression unreadable. "Listen, I've been working for a long time; and not just as a Turk. I know you were a street kid. You probably think you know more about survival than me. Even so, let me give you a piece of hard-won advice: you can't save everyone all the time."

Rod stared right back at him. "Your idea of a pep talk sucks."

"Okay, maybe that was a bad way of putting it. Let me rephrase: you're not responsible for every bad thing that happens to everyone you know. You can only do your best -"

"Spare me the clichés."

"- and if that's not enough, that's all there is to it," Kakutou went on doggedly "It's not enough. You don't whine about it. You might as well whine about needing to blink or breathe oxygen. Some things can't be changed just because you want it badly enough, so you pick yourself up and move on."

"Suck it up and move on? That's your big advice?"

Kakutou said nothing.

"Is that what happened to you?" Rod sniped. "Is that how you became a Turk?" Kakutou's personality was so un-Turk-like, Rod wasn't alone in wondering how the hell the man ended up in the department.

Kakutou looked away. He didn't answer for a long time. Rod began to think he had been dismissed. When Kakutou finally did speak it was curt, frustration swelling below his words like air bubbles in a tar pit. "This isn't the first time I've been to the Costa del Sol."

"And that has what to do with this conversation?"

"Shut up, pup." His tone surprised Rod. Since they found Naifu, Kakutou had been the one calming him down. "This town isn't as sunny and liberated as it likes to make out. It has its own underbelly; it's just better at keeping it hidden."

Rod sensed a shift in the atmosphere; a reversal of some sort.

"When I was a PI," Kakutou went on, "I spent my time exposing that underbelly and saving whatever souls I could from it. I didn't always succeed, but I kept trying. I kept at it for years; poured my heart and soul into fighting the good fight, rescuing people I recognised as innocents. I refused to work for anyone I didn't think was deserving enough. It was judgemental, maybe, but that's how it was. If they were scum, I didn't want to work for them. The only problem was, the ones I thought deserved my help generally didn't have two gil to rub together. Some days I couldn't afford to feed myself or pay my medical bills. I'd literally be falling apart after some bad jobs, but I couldn't pay for a doctor because I had no money."

"Sounds like a crappy existence."

"Seeing the things I saw, year in and year out, getting beaten up and beaten down, and then seeing it happen all over again anyhow … it wears a guy down. I sometimes wondered why I even bothered. I didn't make much of a difference. I was just one man, and while I was good at what I did, most of the time I got my ass handed to me and never collected on my paycheque because I hadn't finished the job, or my client was dead, or I already knew there was no way they could pay me. I'd think about giving up. Then I'd find some innocent who didn't deserve what was happening to them and I'd get sucked back in."

Kakutou paused, staring off into space. Rod watched him, wondering how this story connected with the current situation – and what had prompted the sudden confession. He and Kakutou weren't close. Thinking about it, he couldn't think who Kakutou was close to. Maybe that explained it.

"This town is like the sharks in its ocean," Kakutou said at last. "You think it's calm because it looks that way on the surface, but it likes to take a chunk out of you when you least expect it."

"So … what? You should punch the place on the nose to make it go away."

"Something like that." Kakutou dropped his gaze, raised it to Rod, and then dropped again.

"So why'd you leave?"

"Same story as a lot of folks. I fell for a girl."

"A client?"

He nodded. "She was in big trouble. My hero complex kicked in. We … connected. Or so I thought. I fell hard for her – really thought I loved her. Then it turned out she wasn't as innocent as she wanted me to think. I was in deep before I figured out the truth: she was wanted by Shinra and I was the chump she'd gotten to take on her pursuers and 'make them go away'. Guys fight harder for girls they're in love with, even if those girls don't actually love them back. By the time I got a clue, I was facing off against the company and swimming way out of my depth. Only one of us survived the confrontation with the Turks pursuing her."

Rod didn't have to say the rest: not her.

"I only made it because I was willing to make a deal with the devil. Veld pulled a lot of strings. He thought I could be a better Turk than a detective." Kakutou shrugged, like compromising his morals was no big deal. "Turns out he was right."

Rod tried not to let anything show on his face. "Am I supposed to say 'thank you for sharing'?"

Kakutou snorted with laughter. "No."

"So what's with telling me all that?"

"You asked. And you're more like I was at your age than you'd like to think. I thought I was supposed to protect every single client with my life, but I only had one life, and if I kept trying to spend it, I depleted its value."

"The hell?"

"Don't blame yourself for Naifu. It was unfortunate but it wasn't your fault."

Rod's jaw set. "Did you tell yourself that when that girl you fell for died?"

Kakutou's face didn't change, but dust motes crackled against his skin and the angry heat rolling off him. "Every damn day." Abruptly he got up and stalked to the kitchen. Rod heard him yank the fridge door and pull out something glass. The hiss-pop of a bottle cap followed.

Rod stuffed his hands in his pockets and glanced at the ceiling. This was taking way too long. The longer the healing, the worse the injuries, and the more his anger stoked. When would they be done?

.