A/N: Points to anyone who can spot the side-fling to The Replacement Killers. I do love me some Mira Sorvino/Chow Yun Fat action flicks. ^_^

29. Naifu: Secret-Keeper

"There's a contract out on you?"

"Nothing so formal."

"Screw formal! And you didn't think to mention this before?" Naifu's voice hit a note to shatter glass. She made a conscious effort to bring it back into the range of human hearing.

"I realise this puts you in a difficult position –"

"Screw me!" She blinked. "Um, wait, scratch that. Imagine I rephrased it into something cooler and less suggestive." She waved as if trying to dispel second-hand cigarette smoke. "You're the one in the difficult position. You … you …" Her fists were balled. When did that happen? "You numbskull!"

"Oh … kay. Numbskull?"

"Granted, that's not my best insult, but you are a numbskull. So you're telling me not even Tseng knows about this?"

"Who knows what Tseng knows?"

"Good point. But he hasn't exactly given you a bodyguard, so I'm guessing he doesn't know. By the way, that's a good point, actually. Who guards the bodyguards? The same people who watch the watchers? Or mind the minders?"

Rod patted the bandages under his shirt. His injury hadn't merited a full healing, just a cursory one from a harassed doctor at a downtown Midgar medical centre. Neither he nor Naifu were stupid enough to think the news of them being there wouldn't get back to Shinra, but it wasn't as blatant as going back to base and showing his wound to a Shinra medic. Rod had painkillers and the promise of a working limb. Since Carlito hadn't hit his dominant arm, it would have to be enough for now. They still had a job to do. Speaking of which …

"So what now?" Naifu demanded.

"Now? Now we find that rich kid and get him out of that brothel."

"That's not what I meant and you know it."

"I … I don't know." For once, the unflappable Rod looked pretty darnn flapped. And frustrated. And worried. And … scared?

Naifu did a double take. She didn't think she'd ever seen him worried before. Not genuinely; like something was eating him up inside and his own pig-headed male ego was letting it turn his insides to sludge in silence.

"You didn't get hit with a rubber bullet today."

"I know that."

"That Carlito kid was trying to –"

"I know that!"

"Who was he?" she asked softly.

"I already told you –"

"Not like that. Who was he to you?"

He paused for a long moment, processing her words. "His folks were addicts. Both of them. They died when he was a little kid. He ended up living on the streets with a pack of stray dogs for a while before I found him. Just a few months, but he'd already stopped talking, and he … growled at anyone who came near."

Naifu waited. "Except you," she said at last.

"No, he growled at me too; but he ate the food I gave him and he followed me home. Eventually he told me his name and his story." He was sitting with his hands on his thighs. They scrunched into fists at the memories. He looked like he wanted to pound something – or someone. Maybe Carlito. Maybe this Alejandro character. Maybe himself.

Naifu wouldn't have been surprised at the last one. Rod was super-competitive and judged himself harshly in whatever he did. His competitiveness was what had motivated him to join Shinra. It was what had also made him betray Carlito and all the other kids he had taken care of while pretending to be such a hard-ass street punk. He had thrown all that away to try being the best Turk instead.

"Numbskull," she muttered.

Rod wouldn't meet her gaze. He was scowling. He always scowled, like he was mad at the world even when he was enjoying himself. Naifu had the disorienting sense of seeing someone who was the same as ever and yet suddenly very different. It was like in the Costa del Sol, when she first saw him after she woke up. Was he grieving right now?

She had to squash the empathy that wanted to take over her thoughts. Now was not the time to get all schmoopy. Rod was still Rod, even if one of his strays had died in his arms.

"We still got a mission we have to complete," Rod said.

"Is that you saying you don't want to tell Tseng what you just told me?"

He still refused to meet her gaze.

"What makes you think I won't tell him?"

"Because if you do, every member of the Rage Riders may be dead by morning."

Naifu's jaw clicked shut. She couldn't deny it. The safest, cleanest and most effective way of dealing with a threat to one of their own was to eradicate it in one strike. It was the Turk way. Yet these people – these kids – were … well, people. They weren't just hits. They had names and faces, and Rod knew every one of them. He may have selfishly walked out on his gang, but that didn't mean he had stopped caring – however much he tried to convince himself otherwise. He had told himself he wasn't responsible for them anymore and their fates were none of his concern. That was a lie, but one he found hard to get past. Naifu could see it on his face, leaking through hairline cracks in his expression like trickles of magma down the side of a volcano. She wondered what would happen when the realisation finally erupted.

"You have to deal with this, Rod. You can't just ostrich it away."

"Ostrich?"

"You know; bury your head in the sand and hope everything goes away on its own. Talk about immature."

Abruptly he stood. He buttoned his jacket, straightened his hair and squared his jaw. In five seconds he went from human being to Turk, all messy emotions gone from his face like dirt wiped off a smooth metal surface with a damp cloth. Except for the tightness at the sides of his mouth and the unease still lurking in his eyes, you'd never know he was anything but a consummate professional.

Scary, Naifu thought. Scary how easy it was to lose yourself to this job.

She stared at her own palm, sheathed in its fingerless glove. Her hand tightened into a fist again. They all had their own crosses to bear. Rod had shared his with her, but she hadn't done the same in return. Legend knew more about her past than her own partner, and even that had been an accident. Rod trusted her enough to let her behind his defences. She couldn't – wouldn't – betray that trust by passing on what she knew when he didn't want her to.

"It's your decision," she said. "I've got your back. Just don't expect me to keep quiet forever. This is a threat to your life, Rod, and somehow, since becoming your partner, I developed a problem with watching you die."

Rod didn't say anything for a long moment. "Thanks," he mumbled. Then he headed for the door.

Naifu followed, wondering why a shiver crept up her spine when the room wasn't even cold.